Connections
by Super Chocolate Bear
Summary: Flash fleetingly glimpses an old flame from his Teen Titans days, and sets out to find her with Shayera's help.
1. The Unexpected

Disclaimer: I don't own _Justice League Unlimited _or _Teen Titans. _It would be cool for me if I did, though.

_**Connections**_

_**Chapter One: The Unexpected**_

_As Wally West sat in the restaurant, only one thought dominated his usually busy mind:_

That's a big burger.

_Wally took in his surroundings, and instantly realised he was in Louie's Diner. He grinned as a feeling of familiarity washed over him. He loved Louie's Diner, mostly because they would feed him as many burgers as he wanted, no questions asked. Though he had never eaten a burger quite _this _big before. It was literally a huge burger, being the size of one of Bruce's dinner tables. Wally wondered if he should be curious as to how they even managed to find an oven big enough to bake the bread bun, but settled for shrugging._

"_Hey, more for me," he said, rubbing his hands together and licking his lips in anticipation._

_Just as he was about to take his first bite, the burger opened, and a voice emerged. A familiar voice._

"_Wally? Are you there?"_

_The red headed speedster frowned in confusion. "Shayera?"_

_The burger opened and closed with every word spoken. "Wally? You better not be sleeping in again… Wally! Wake up!"_

"_What? I'm not sleeping! I'm just eating you! Is that a crime?"_

_Wally paused._

"_Wait… if Shayera is a burger the size of a limo, then… ah, dammit."_

Wally's eyelids slowly rose, revealing the bleary green eyes hidden beneath. He sat up in his bed and yawned slowly, proceeding to rub his eyes as he gradually made his way out of bed.

"_Wally?"_

He scowled at the closet where his Flash costume and communicator were kept. "Give me a minute, Shayera! Geez, you'd think it was a mission or something…"

Wally's eyes widened.

_Oops._

He rushed over to the closet and quickly got changed into his Flash costume, quickly pushing his hand to his earpiece.

"Uh… sorry! Coming, coming now!"

He said it so fast he wasn't sure that Shayera had heard a single word except 'sorry', but that was the only word that mattered anyway. As he hopped around the room trying to pull on his golden boots, he noticed a note next to the phone. He noticed it for what seemed the hundredth time that week. He really had to tell Bart to stop taking messages for him. It seemed that every time he picked up the phone he ended up confusing or annoying whoever was calling. The note simply read:

_Heather called – she's smoking hot, so you're crazy if you don't._

That was another reason Wally was getting continually irritated with Bart picking up the phone. He would let out little comments like that and completely ruin the state of Wally's love life. Not that it was anything to brag about _before _Bart came along, though he would never admit that to anyone. Well, except Shayera and Dick, but they knew without Wally having to tell them anything. Wally was just glad that Bart spent most of his time with the Teen Titans as Kid Flash, although he did miss the teenage speedster now and then.

Only now and then.

The left boot finally relented and slipped on.

_Okay… leftie decided to fit, so about you follow suit, rightie?_

But the right boot would not give up; it would rather be crushed than fit on Wally's foot. The Flash was never the luckiest of people when it came to the little things. The big things were no problem. He was in excellent health, he had great superpowers, and he lived in a city where the people adored him. But throw any little things at him, like trying to keep a roof over his head and meet women? No way.

Another thing he had trouble with was boots.

_Stupid._

_Friggin'._

_Boots._

And of course, for someone who wasn't lucky with the little things, all that hopping was bound to lead to an unfortunate ending for Wally. He toppled forward, his face colliding with the wooden floor before he even had a chance to raise his arms. Landing with a loud thud, Wally only let out a muffled groan before rolling over onto his back. A banging came from below him, followed by the angry, muffled voice of Mr Reid.

"West! It's 3:00 AM! Keep it down in there! People are trying to sleep!"

_3:00 AM? 3:00 AM!_

Wally quickly sat up and violently jerked his right boot onto his leg.

_She got me up at 3:00 AM!_

"Sorry, Mr Reid."

"You'd better be sorry, you little snot nosed punk kid!"

Wally smiled. "Thank you for understanding, Mr Reid."

He quickly stood and was about to leave when he saw the note once again. With a frown on his face, he paused for a moment before he quickly ran out of the room, locking the door in a blur of red and yellow. He slipped the key underneath the door and took off, glad to get out of the enclosed space of his apartment. As much as he loved that place, it always felt wrong to him to be in there in his Flash costume. That scarlet and gold costume represented freedom to the red headed speedster, it always had, and it always would.

After exiting the building out of an open window, Wally shot down the building and onto the street, heading for his rendezvous point with Shayera. The winged heroine's voice hissed over his communicator.

"_Wally! Where are you?"_

Wally scowled and put his hand to his earpiece. "I'm coming, Shayera. Geez, lighten up!"

"_Lighten up? Lighten up! You were supposed to be here early! You know, when you said, 'I'll be there early, since it's my home town'?"_

"I believe I said 'home turf'," Wally responded in an aristocratic voice.

Shayera just growled and ended the conversation. The Flash grinned.

_She's not angry. Not really._

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Shayera was angry. Really angry.

And it was usually a certain speedster that made her this way. Sure, she had been angry at criminals and villains before (and Batman more than a few times), but Wally was the only person she had met who could consistently make her angry, worried, or generally subject her to unhealthy amounts of stress. And he always knew he was doing it, with a happy grin and nothing but airy joy in his eyes. But that didn't mean that he was on her mind a lot. Pretty much the opposite; since they spent so much time together, Shayera's brain had created a wall to prevent thinking about Wally, because otherwise too much of her time would be taken up with the Scarlet Speedster.

That left her thoughts to linger on the two men dancing around in her life at the moment; Carter Hall and John Stewart, Hawkman and Green Lantern respectively. Shayera closed her eyes and shook her head, silently berating herself. It wasn't like those two were anything to linger on, seeing as Carter Hall was a slightly brain damaged (if handsome and charming) man who thought he was a descendant of an ancient Thanagarian, and John was seemingly over her. Overall, her love life wasn't anything to show off.

Yet another thing that she and Wally had talked about. As the self proclaimed Fastest Man Alive intruded through her mental wall, he arrived on the rooftop, coming to a quick halt next to her.

"Sorry!"

Shayera frowned. "Damn right, you're sorry. You should have been here an hour ago."

Wally's eyes widened beneath his crimson mask. "2:00 AM? Really?"

"Actually," Shayera said, sighing, "you were supposed to be here at 1:30 to 'scope out the place'. Ringing any bells?"

"Um… vaguely…"

Shayera sighed again, and put her hand on her face in exasperation. "Never mind. You're here now."

Flash nodded and followed Shayera's gaze to the warehouse opposite them. "That's the place, huh?"

Shayera nodded, and Wally frowned, crossing his arms. "I don't like it."

"Why?" Shayera asked, a slightly amused eyebrow raised.

"Because I don't like anonymous tips. They always end up being bad or spooky. Do we even know who it was that told us?"

Shayera shook her head, her red hair tossing slightly as she did so. "That's why it's called anonymous, Wally. He didn't leave a name, and we couldn't trace the call."

"You _do _know this is probably a trap, right?"

"We can't ignore it. We don't know what's in there."

"I know," he huffed, and let himself relax. "So… how are things with you? Hawkman called you back yet?"

"That's not funny."

Flash raised his arms defensively. "Okay, okay…" Wally paused. "So… you talked to John recently?"

"No," she responded automatically. She paused and an eyebrow rose. "Why?"

"No reason," Wally said, a conspiratorial smile on his face.

"What have you done, Wally?" Shayera asked warningly.

"_I _haven't done anything."

The red haired Thanagarian paused. "What's that supposed to mean? Is John-?"

"I'm not saying anything."

Shayera grit her teeth. "Wally…"

"Sorry. My lips are sealed."

Shayera slowly clenched her fist, and Wally barely hid his wince, wondering if he should move out of her reach. She took a deep breath and calmed herself.

"Fine. Let's change the subject. How are things with you? Is Bart okay?"

Wally sighed, silently glad that Shayera had changed the subject. "He's fine. He just causes me a lot of trouble."

"You mean as Kid Flash?"

The Flash squirmed slightly under such scrutiny. "More with my social life."

"Ah, I see," Shayera said, smirking.

A scowl broke out over the speedster's face. "What?"

"You're blaming someone else for your woman troubles. And a kid, too. That's not very heroic, Wally."

"I'm _not_-" Wally's voice rose a defensive octave, and he calmed himself before continuing. He leaned closer and continued, his voice a low murmur. "I'm _not _blaming Bart; he _does _cause me trouble."

"Oh, come on. Like what?"

"Like when I'm out and Bart's home alone and decides to take my calls for me."

Shayera smiled. "I think that's pretty nice of him."

The scarlet speedster laughed sarcastically. "It _would _be nice of him if he didn't ask questions like 'are you hot? 'Cos Wally only goes out with hot chicks'."

This time Shayera burst out laughing, though her laughter was anything but sarcastic. The Fastest Man Alive scowled and she covered her mouth.

"Sorry. So does Bart… help with all the women? Or do you…"

"Oh no, I've got a few… uh… prospects."

Shayera smiled. "And would these prospects have names?"

"Uh… well… when I said _prospects_, I meant… uh…" Wally's voice lowered to a mumble. "…prospect."

"I'm sorry. What was that?" Shayera asked mockingly, cupping her hand around her ear.

Wally threw his arms up in the air. "Fine! It's just one girl, all right?"

Green eyes rolled. "Not Fire again…"

Flash smiled sarcastically. "No, it's not Fire." He paused. "She _is _hot though…" he said dreamily, his eyes wandering up to the sky.

"Wally? Could we stay on topic?"

The redhead shook his head quickly and grinned. "Sorry. Anyway, her name's Heather. I met her at the K.C.P.D New Year's party."

"_You _were invited to the New Year's party?"

"Yeah. I perform a vital and important function in the police force of the twin cities, thank you very much."

"You do _know _you're a mechanic, right?"

"A mechanic's important… and I save their butts every day as the Flash, so… I figure I should have been invited anyway."

Shayera shook her head. "Right… anyway… do you like her?"

"She's okay," he said nonchalantly, shrugging.

"What's wrong with her?" Shayera asked, a tired strain on her voice from the many times she had asked him this in the past.

"Nothing! It's just… I dunno… there's something…"

"What? You know, I sometimes wonder if you just don't want to get in a relationship with a woman. Have you had bad experiences or something?"

"You have no idea…" Wally mumbled, turning his head away.

"What?"

"I-" he stopped as he spotted movement in front of the warehouse in front of them. He pointed it out to Shayera, who quickly turned to see the costumed villains known as the Key and Livewire approaching the large metal door of the warehouse.

"Since when do they work together?" Wally whispered, and Shayera just frowned in response. She readied herself to stand up when Wally put his hand on her arm.

"Wait. Let me have a try first," he said, shaking his hands to loosen the joints.

"You're kidding, right?"

"Ah, come on. It's my way of making up for being late. If I need help, feel free to fly in. But I don't think I'll need it," he said as he grinned, winking at her.

"Oh, yom shigureth… fine. Knock yourself out. Which you probably will."

Flash cricked his neck, his grin growing. He rubbed his hands together in anticipation. "Well all right."

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Remind me again why we're here?"

The Key didn't look at her, simply staring forward as his key worked on the electronic lock on the warehouse.

"Because Grodd said so."

Livewire yawned theatrically. "You're such a good soldier, you know that? He's just a gorilla."

"A gorilla that can fry your brain with much more efficiency than your powers could muster, so I suggest you be quiet and look out for anything suspicious."

The blue skinned girl grinned. "Oh, please. No-one's gonna think to look for us in this boooring warehouse district. What's in there, anyway?"

The Key sighed, halting his unlocking process as he turned to look at her in frustration. "It's-"

He was interrupted by a red blur slamming into him, sending him hurtling back and skidding along the floor, eventually coming to a stop below a water tower.

"Your jail sentence, buddy," the Flash said, his hands on his hips and a grin on his face. He turned to face Livewire. "Hey cutie. You with him?"

"Yep," she said, smirking as she charged up and threw several bolts of electricity at him. The Fastest Man Alive easily dodged the bolts, keeping his arms crossed as he dodged.

"Oops, missed me. Missed again. And again."

Livewire scowled and growled in frustration. She charged up her electrical field and created a storm of electrical bolts. Flash still managed to dodge the bolts, though his cocky demeanour had disappeared.

"Yow! Hey! Watch it; you almost got me that time!"

She couldn't believe it. He was laughing at him. At her, Livewire, the supervillain who could give _Superman _trouble. And now some fast footed punk dressed like a tomato was giving her the run around. A bolt of golden energy struck the Flash in the back, and he yelled in pain as he fell forward. Livewire looked over to the distance to see the Key approaching, his weapon smoking slightly from being recently fired. Smirking, she poured on the current, sending electric shock after electric shock through her opponents' body. The Key looked over at her.

"Keep him still. I'll open the door."

He was about to walk forward when he heard a loud warrior cry, followed by a mace slamming into his chest, sending him flying into the warehouse opposite. Upon impact, he dented the metal door, seemingly falling unconscious from the blow.

Shayera turned her attention to Livewire, who was still electrocuting Flash with everything she had. Shayera flew towards her.

"Hey, sparky!"

Livewire looked up at her and stopped her barrage on the Flash to fling a bolt of electricity at her. Shayera smirked as the electricity was attracted to the mystical energy of her mace. Livewire's eyes widened and Shayera swung her mace forward. Livewire managed to erect a force field to soften the blow, though it still ended up sending her flying backwards and into the air. Shayera looked over her shoulder to see Wally getting to his feet and giving her a thumbs up before charging towards the quickly recovering Key. Shayera turned her attention to Livewire, easily deflecting her electrical attacks.

Meanwhile, the Scarlet Speedster ran towards the Key, who was staggering to his feet. Moaning in pain, he looked up to see the Flash on what seemed to be a collision course. He placed his Key weapon face down on the ground in front of him and fired, sending shockwaves out through the ground. Knocked back by the shockwave of energy, the Fastest Man Alive quickly recovered, flipping to his feet and skidding backwards slightly. As he brought his head up to look at the Key as a bolt of golden energy slammed into his chest full force, sending him shooting backwards below the same water tower he had earlier slammed the Key into.

The Key allowed a small smile before heading over to the struggling Livewire. He fired his weapon as he closed in, hitting Shayera directly in the back and through the metal door of the warehouse to which they were trying to gain entry. Livewire floated down next to the Key.

"What took you so long?"

He didn't respond. "Watch them while I go inside."

He stepped forward, but was knocked back by a blur of red and yellow. He tried to fire his weapon, but quickly found he was being thrown upwards in a cyclone. He looked over at Livewire, who was obviously having a hard time concentrating enough to use her powers. He made a mental note; Grodd would want to know about that. As he felt the air being pulled from his lungs, he fired his Key weapon down at the ground, tearing it apart. The Flash tripped on the debris let loose by the explosion and fell forward, his cyclone disappearing.

The pair landed, and Livewire put her hand to her head and moaned from the motion sickness. The Key shook his head and took aim at the scarlet speedster, only to find himself caught in a miniature whirlwind created by the Flash spinning his arms at high speed. Unable to keep their grip on the ground, the two were thrown back into the water tower.

Wally took a deep breath, and was about to go inside the warehouse to find Shayera when Livewire, seemingly recovered from her nausea, was once again bombarding him with electricity, albeit from a distance. The Key stood next to her, a slightly smug smirk on his face. Wally toppled forward in pain.

Shayera pulled herself out of the twisted metal and instantly saw Flash keeled over on all fours, gritting his teeth. She stepped forward, about to intercept the electricity with her mace, when Wally shook his head.

"Water tower…" he managed, looking over to where Livewire and the Key were stood. Shayera looked over and nodded, taking to the air. The Key instantly noticed her, firing his weapon at her as rapidly as he could. She gracefully dipped and arched over the energy beams and slowly began to spin her mace. After building up the right amount of momentum, she tossed the mace at the water tower, smashing a hole through the side, sending a torrent of water out over Livewire.

She yelled in pain as electricity danced around her, and the Key backed away to avoid any harmful side effects from his proximity. She collapsed to the ground, unconscious, and the Key quickly recovered from the loss of his comrade, firing off yet more shots at Shayera in a vain attempt to hit her. He ran around behind the water tower, obscuring himself from Shayera's view. Cursing, she flew around, feeling almost naked without her mace. As she encircled the water tower, she saw the Key taking aim, only for his weapon to suddenly disappear from his grip.

He looked at his hand in amazement, then looked over to his right to see Wally twirling the weapon on his finger, the familiar Flash grin on his face. He looked back to Shayera, but was only greeted by her fist, instantly knocking him unconscious.

"A nice job, if I say so myself," the Fastest Man Alive boasted, tossing the weapon over his shoulder.

Shayera grinned, picking up her discarded mace. She frowned.

"Looks like we missed one," she said, nodding over Wally's shoulder. The Flash grin disappeared, and he looked over to see a shadowy figure retreating around the corner of a warehouse in the distance. He looked back to Shayera.

"You look after these two; I'll take care of him."

"You mean like you took care of them?" she asked, gesturing to the unconscious forms of Livewire and The Key.

"Yeah… well… whatever."

And with that, he sped after the mysterious figure. Shayera shook her head.

"Yom shigureth…"

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Knock knock!"

The figure turned in alarm. Wally squinted. Whoever they were, they seemed awfully familiar…

"Trying to leave the party early, bud-"

Wally was knocked back by pink energy, slamming him into the wall of the dark alleyway. He shook his head.

_Wait… pink?_

The figure stepped out of the shadows. His eyes widened beneath his mask, and his jaw dropped. She was exactly as she was when he had last seen her, though older. The only difference was her eyes. They lacked the energy that had attracted Wally to her all those years ago.

"Jinx? What're you-?"

Before he could finish, Jinx hexed the wall behind him, causing it to collapse on him. He attempted to move, but he tripped over his own feet, falling to the ground with a thud. The bricks collapsed down on him painfully, encompassing him in darkness.

"Flash?"

He looked up, his vision still blurry from being knocked unconscious. He saw the faint flickering of red and blue.

"Cops are here already?"

"Flash… you've been out for about half an hour."

He sat up quickly. "Then... did you find-"

Shayera shook her head. "No, he got away."

"He's a she. It was…" he looked towards the collapsed wall of the warehouse.

"What?"

"…someone I know."

"What? A rogue?"

Wally shook his head. "No. Well, yeah. Kinda. She's not…" He sighed, rubbing the back of his neck. "It's complicated."

Shayera put a hand on his shoulder. "Are you okay?"

He frowned deeply beneath his mask. "No, I'm not. I want to know why she's doing this. And I'm going to find out."

The scarlet speedster sprang to his feet, startling Shayera slightly.

"See you back at the Metro Tower."

Before she could respond, he was gone, leaving only a gust of wind in his wake. She frowned in thought, wondering who it could have been to have had such an effect on him. Very few things could make Wallace West become so serious. Shayera's eyes widened slightly as something occurred to her.

_Wait… a she? Maybe an old flame?_

After watching the police take Livewire and the Key away, she took to the sky. As she rhythmically beat her wings in the crisp morning air, she looked down on the glistening city as the sun rose in the horizon.

_And here I was thinking we'd run out of things to talk about…_

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

(A/N: All right, all right, I _know _that _Teen Titans _isn't officially in continuity with _Justice League Unlimited_, but it _could _be, and that's enough for me. _Lightspeed _got my writing gears working, and some Christmas Flash graphic novels got them spinning at... erm… light speed, I guess.

And for those of you who've never seen the show, trust me, it isn't required (though it _is _recommended). All will become clear later on in the story. Same goes for the Bart/Kid Flash references. I just thought it'd be something fun for Wally and Shayera to talk about.

Anyways, what'd you guys and gals think? Interested or bored? Review and inform!

And happy New Year, peeps.)


	2. Gathering Information

Disclaimer: I like _Justice League Unlimited._ Own it? No.

_**Connections**_

_**Chapter Two: Gathering Information**_

Usually, he was a patient man. He was an understanding man. To be a superhero, it was pretty much a requirement of the job to have that kind of temperament. To have an attitude otherwise would be a mistake. At least, that is what he had gathered from his experience training with the Q foundation. But there was only so much that Aztek could take. He interrupted his scan cycle and whirled on his heel to face the Flash.

"Could you _please _stop tapping your foot?"

The scarlet speedster's rapidly tapping foot froze, and he scowled at the golden clad superhero. "Fine," he mumbled, turning and walking away.

With a shake of his head, Aztek got back to work, reinitiating his scan. Shayera followed Wally to where he now stood, his arms folded and his head tilted up to the sky. She could tell that his eyes were closed beneath his mask from experience; he only ever did so when something was truly bothering him. The first time she had seen him like this was when they were flung back in time to World War Two.

"_Flash?"_

_He simply ignored her at first, and she presumed he was staring up at the sky._

"_Flash? Are you okay?"_

_After waving a hand in front of his face, she realised his eyes were closed. On closer inspection, he was taking deep breaths through his nose and letting them out from his mouth, as if he were trying to keep himself calm._

"_Something wrong?"_

_At first she thought he was still angry at her having left John, but he seemed more rattled than angry._

"_Flash!"_

_His head whipped to look at her with such speed and annoyance she was taken aback._

"_What? What is it? What do you want?"_

"_I just wanted to know if you were all right."_

"_I'm fine."_

"_No you're not. And I don't want you messing up out there because you were too busy thinking about stuff in here," she said, knocking on his head. "Now what's bothering you?"_

"_That!" he said, pointing at the makeshift medical tent. "Before now, this was all stuff I read about and watched movies about. And now I'm here, and… I don't…"_

"_You've never seen war before." Flash shook his head, and she laid a sympathetic hand on his shoulder. "I know it's difficult the first time, but you'll just have to work through it."_

_He was silent for a moment, and his next words were little more than a mumble. "They brought this guy in a few minutes ago… he was screaming and screaming… I've never heard someone screaming like that. I've seen some pretty nasty stuff, but… I just… there was so much blood… I didn't even know there was that much blood in the human body, you know?" he said, letting out a desperate chuckle._

_Shayera was at a loss for words. She'd seen this kind of reaction before, but never in someone she cared about. _

_It hurt._

"_You know what the worst part is?" he asked, a trace of bitterness in his voice that she had never heard before._

_She shook her head dumbly._

"_When we first arrived, the only thing I could think about was how cool it was to be here."_

_He tilted his head back up to the sky, and Shayera still couldn't think of anything to say. Believing that he would get better as time went on, she had left him alone. When the time came to get back to work, he was back to his old self, as if the conversation between them had never happened._

But it had, and Shayera had seen him in a completely different light from that day on. It was probably what prompted their friendship to blossom further like it did. And here she was, performing the same task again for her long time friend. She lay a hand on his shoulder and felt him relax.

"I hope that's you, Shayera, because Aztek and I aren't that close."

She smiled. At least he was joking again. That meant it couldn't be _too _serious.

"I don't know… he could be hiding some latent attraction to you."

He turned with a smile on his face, though his voice still had a more sombre tone to it. "How long does it take him to find this stuff, anyway?"

"It's bound to take him awhile, Wally; it _has _been a few hours, after all."

"I guess," he mumbled, throwing a troubled frown in Aztek's direction. Shayera decided not to bring up the fact that it was Wally's fault that they took so long to call the Watchtower for assistance. Instead of going to the Metro Tower, Wally had decided to search the twin cities relentlessly for some trace of the girl whose name she had found out was Jinx. It had taken her one of those three hours to find him and get just that much out of him.

"You're lucky he even came down here at all to check the place out; he was sleeping when we called."

Although the white lenses of his mask hid the action well, Shayera knew that Wally was rolling his eyes. "I know, I know… I'll say sorry later." He paused. "But only if he finds something," he said, a slightly mischievous grin on his face.

"Well, from what you said she was only in the alleyway for a few seconds. He might _not_ find anything."

"Found something."

She turned with a frown to look at Aztec, and she could practically feel Wally's triumphant grin on the back of her head. However, Flash's tone of voice indicated otherwise.

"What is it?"

The confused frown was apparent beneath Aztek's golden helmet. "A strange energy signature. Pretty weak, but it was there."

"What could have caused it? Energy discharge?" Shayera asked, a red eyebrow raised.

"No; they have a very distinct signature, and this isn't it. This looks more like a transmission waveform."

Wally was suddenly stood next to her. "You mean like mind control?"

The gold clad superhero nodded. "It's possible. I'll have to run it through the Watchtower computer and check it against all known waveforms. I'll get back to you on it."

Pushing two fingers against the communicator in his ear, Aztec looked at the two expectantly. "If you two want to come up and wait, that's fine. It'll take a few hours, though."

Shayera waited for the smart comment from Wally, but his only response was a terse nod. Looking at her young friend in surprise, she also nodded.

"Watchtower. Three for pickup."

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The beard was itching again. He resisted the urge to scratch, and it took all of his military training to stop himself. Why did he get this thing in the first place, anyway?

Oh, that's right.

Mari suggested it. John Stewart, the Green Lantern designated to Sector 2814, scowled as he walked the corridors of the Watchtower. Several League members and employees seemed ready to wave greetings to him until they saw his knotted brow, and thought better of it. John would normally have felt slightly guilty for being so damn rude, but at the moment, he was finding it difficult to care. His mind was dominated with thoughts of two women. Two women who shouldn't be causing him this much trouble. He was with Mari, not Shayera. And Shayera was with that Carter Hall. Or was she? Batman had never told him about what had happened in Egypt, and he hadn't felt completely comfortable talking to Shayera about it.

He sighed as he reached the elevator and pushed the button. Hopefully some disaster would arise soon and distract him from his problems. The doors opened, revealing Wally and Shayera. Silently cursing his luck, he stepped into the elevator and the doors shut behind him and they resumed on their way.

"Um… hi."

"Hey," Shayera offered. John looked at his speedster friend curiously, wondering what had him so downcast. The elevator came to a stop, and Shayera awkwardly made her way past him.

"Tell me when you get the results, all right?"

Wally just nodded. He waited for the doors to close before turning to the Fastest Man Alive.

"Results? What's she talking about?"

Wally shrugged. "It's nothing."

John wasn't sure how to respond to that. He wasn't used to Wally being so curt.

"O…kay."

They both stood in an uncomfortable silence, the hum of the elevator dragging it out even longer.

"So… you talked to Shayera yet?"

John's eyes thinned. "Why?"

"No reason. I was just wondering."

"Wally…" the Lantern warned, turning his entire body towards the scarlet speedster. Flash raised his hands defensively.

"It's nothing!"

"I swear, if you're planning something-"

"_I'm _not planning anything."

John's green eyes widened. "You mean Shayera's-?"

"It's nothing, I swear!" he replied quickly, some of the old Flash liveliness in his voice.

The elevator came to a halt, and Wally stepped out. "See you later GL," a hint of smugness penetrating his voice.

As the doors closed, the Green Lantern of Sector 2814 couldn't help but wonder what the hell was going on.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Anything?"

Aztek sighed. "Not yet, sorry." He turned to face her. "Did this have anything to do with magic, by any chance?"

The red headed Thanagarian shrugged. "Could be. Her name's Jinx, so I suppose it's possible. Why?"

"There was a lot of background interference in the area, and from my experience, that's usually a result of magic messing around with science."

Smiling wryly, she nodded. "I take it you don't like magic?"

"Hate it. You?"

"It has its uses," she said, gesturing to her mace.

"I see…" he said through a yawn, and glanced over at the monitor. "Well, I'm going to leave this to search for any matches. I need to catch up on my sleep."

"Again, sorry about that."

He waved a dismissive hand. "Not a problem. Good night. Or is that good morning? Gah… I don't even want to think about it."

She smiled apologetically and turned to the computer. There were literally thousands of different waveforms in the database, each one used by a different criminal organisation or supervillain. Shayera's thoughts drifted to Wally yet again. She was truly surprised by the drastic change him. He was almost a completely different superhero. He seemed more mature, more serious… more Superman, to put it simply. But of course, her mind was more preoccupied with the ever present question:

_Who is Jinx?_

She sat down at the computer next to the one performing the search and got to work, initiating a scan for anything with the words 'Jinx' and 'Flash'. Finding nothing except some tabloid headlines about Wally tripping over, thereby being 'jinxed', she began thinking about Jinx in more detail.

_He used to be a member of the Teen Titans… could he have met her then?_

She searched for 'Titans' and 'Jinx', and still came up with little.

"Screw it," she mumbled, and simply typed in 'Jinx'. A picture of a pale girl with pink hair appeared on the screen, and Shayera smiled.

"Bingo."

Her smile disappeared as she saw that she was deceased, at least according to the most recent reports. Shayera scrolled down, reading on about her involvement with the Hive, and how they had clashed with the Teen Titans on various occasions, usually working for some other benefactor when they did. Then during one final battle with the Titans, she was apparently killed. It didn't say how, where, or even when, simply that she had died. Shayera frowned and sighed. Her eyes were telling her one thing, but her brain and instincts were telling her something very different.

"Interesting reading?"

The chair squeaked as she turned to face John Stewart.

"Very," she said, turning back to the monitor.

"'Jinx'? Who's that?"

"That's what _I _want to know," she said, resting her head on her hand as she blew one of the red bangs from her face. John smiled slightly.

"I see you still haven't cut them off."

"And _I_ see you still haven't gotten rid of this," she said, pointing a finger at his beard. "Doesn't it itch?"

"No," he said, and they both smiled at the familiarity of this kind of discussion. After a brief silence, John nodded towards the pale skinned teenager on the screen. "So… why are you looking up this 'Jinx' girl?"

"Because _she _is what's got Flash running up the walls. No pun intended."

"Old girlfriend?" he asked, an eyebrow raised.

She shrugged and sighed. "I don't know. He's not exactly being forthcoming. You know how hard it is to get him to talk about his Kid Flash days under _normal_ conditions, so…"

The Lantern frowned and nodded. "And I bet the more you ask him about it, the more defensive he gets."

"You see my problem. And here's the kicker." She pointed to the monitor. "She's supposed to be dead."

"Aren't all good villains?"

"I'm serious."

John leaned forward to look at the monitor and his frown deepened. "Maybe I should talk to him."

Now it was Shayera's turn to frown. "Why would that make a difference?"

He almost jumped back from the sudden change in tone. Almost. "I don't know… maybe he'd feel more, uh… comfortable…"

"Sharing with a _man_ like yourself?"

John's frown loosened slightly. "Well, that _is_ oneaspect you lack in spades."

They shared another comfortable silence before John headed for the door. "I'll go and talk to him. It might not make a difference, but it's worth a shot."

"Don't tell him we've been snooping, all right? That'll just make him worse."

"What do you mean, 'we'?"

"Just shut up and go play Dr Phil, all right?"

With a grin on his face, John Stewart left the room. Maybe she _was_ planning something, after all.

Shayera grinned as John left the room. Maybe he _was _planning something, after all.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

There was nothing that could make him feel better more than a huge pile of burgers. But even that was doing little to take his mind off of Jinx. There were so many questions in his head he didn't know what to do with them. Had he been lied to? Had she actually died that day? Or was this someone else just trying to mess with him? He didn't know. He wasn't sure he wanted to know. The thought occurred to him that it could perhaps be in his best interest to let this go if Aztek didn't find anything. The Kid Flash part of his brain disagreed.

_What if she's in trouble? You're just going to leave her?_

Of course, Wally already knew the answer to _that _question. The chair beside him made a scraping noise as John Stewart pulled it back.

"Hey."

The scarlet speedster gave him a nod, stuffing another burger into his mouth. He already knew why John was here, but he decided to give him the benefit of the doubt. He could be there to talk about bowling or something. Looking down, he noticed that John didn't even have a tray for his food.

"What's up?" he asked, trying his best not to let any burger crumbs fly from his mouth.

"Shayera says that-"

Wally smiled. "Oh, so you two are talking now, huh? I knew you'd-"

"Flash, that's not why-"

"I mean, that's why I started to talk to you two about-"

"Flash! That's not what I'm talking about!"

Wally stopped talking and sighed. "Yeah, I know. You want to talk about Jinx, right?"

"I don't see why you can't just tell us why it's bothering you so much."

"Because it's personal and I don't want to talk about it."

John head moved back slightly, surprised at the curtness of the speedster's response. He leaned forward and lowered his voice. "We're your friends, Wally. We just want to help you out."

Flash took another bite of his burger. "Then stop asking me."

He seemed ready to take another bite, but then thought better of it, half heartedly dropping it on the tray. After pushing back his chair and standing, he picked up the tray and left. John sighed and rubbed the bridge of his nose with his thumb and forefinger. The chair where Wally was sat suddenly moved forward, and John looked up quickly, hoping that Flash had come back, but was greeted with the sight of the Dark Knight.

"What was that about?" he said, taking a sip of his drink.

"Nothing."

"Nothing. Right."

He looked up at the cloaked billionaire and scowled. "That's right, nothing."

"I hear something went wrong during his mission with Shayera."

The Green Lantern sighed, rubbing the back of his neck. "That's basically right. Flash ran into an old acquaintance; some girl called Jinx."

Batman stopped eating his meal and looked up at John. "Jinx?"

"Yeah. Why? You know her?"

He nodded silently. "Worked for the Hive Academy from a young age. Fought the Titans on more than a few occasions. If memory serves, she's dead."

"_Supposed _to be dead; these things never are concrete with our line of work." He raised a dark eyebrow. "How do you know so much about her, anyway?"

"I had a… vested interest in the Titans during their earlier days."

The speaker system crackled to life.

"_Flash, Shayera Hol, this is Aztek. Please report to the command center; your scans are done."_

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Wally West turned to see John entering the room, Bruce following. He briefly wondered why Bruce was here at all, but he pushed it aside. He was the one person that Wally knew wouldn't pry into his business, anyway. Probably because he already knew, though Flash wasn't sure of it. He just assumed that Batman always had one eye on everything at all times.

"Well?" he asked Aztek, who was sat at the computer diligently typing away. He pushed a button, and the results of the scan came up on the screen.

"Sorry Flash. I couldn't find anything in the League database that's anywhere near a match."

Wally's shoulders sank slightly, and Shayera put a sympathetic hand on his shoulder. Batman leaned over Aztek's shoulder, looking at the monitor.

"Bring up the waveform signature."

Aztek looked up at who was asking and quickly turned back to the monitor, bringing up the requested data. Batman's eyes thinned into white slits. John tilted his head to the side.

"What? You recognise it?"

Bruce nodded and began tapping away at another computer screen as he spoke. "It's a waveform produced by mind control devices that were invented by a man named Jervis Tetch." He finished typing and pushed one final key, bringing up a profile picture on the monitor.

Wally raised an eyebrow incredulously. The way he was dressed, he almost looked like…

"Otherwise known as the Mad Hatter."

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

(A/N: And there's chapter two for y'all. Not much to say here, except review!)


	3. Discounting Evidence

Disclaimer: I don't be owning none of this.

_**Connections**_

**_Chapter Three: Discounting Evidence_**

As he and Shayera appeared in the Batcave in a flash of blue light, Wally couldn't help but be amazed. He was amazed every time he came here. Of course, he hadn't been here that often ever since he had installed Pac Man on the Bat computer. He never understood why Bruce got so ticked off – Robin had told him that Bats hadn't uninstalled it, so he must obviously enjoy it too. He mentally shrugged it off as the butler entered the cave from the stairway.

"Ah, you're here. Master Bruce told me to expect you. I'm afraid he is otherwise occupied on business at the moment, so you'll have to wait."

The scarlet speedster cocked an eyebrow beneath his mask. "Is that Bruce Wayne business or Bats business?"

A slight smile danced across the butler's lips. "Hmm… 'Bats'. I've never heard that before."

"It's what I do," Wally quickly replied, a grin on his face.

"Tea? Coffee?"

Shayera smiled. "Tea, please."

Alfred nodded and looked to Wally. "And for you?"

"Coffee, milk, 26 sugars."

Alfred smiled politely and nodded, not batting an eyelid. As he left, Wally started his exploration of the Batcave. He had always thought that there was a little kid inside Batman somewhere. He had his suspicions when he realised that Bruce put the word 'Bat' before each piece of equipment; Batarang, Batmobile, Batpants (Wally had made that one up, but still)… Only a kid would do that.

And this just proved it.

He was a collector.

He stopped in front of the giant dinosaur that had so grabbed his attention the first time he came here. The grin that spread over his face attracted Shayera over to him, and she looked up at the giant lizard.

"Do you want one?"

"Yes please ma." Wally looked around the room, taking in every little detail. His attention was attracted to the giant coin he had used to squash two Thanagarian soldiers. The smile disappeared from his face briefly, the circumstances of that battle suddenly entering his mind. The smile quickly returned as Shayera stood beside him. No need to make her uncomfortable; she was here to help him, after all.

Though part of him wished she wasn't.

"Why don't we have this?" Wally asked, still staring at the coin.

"What? A cave?"

The scarlet speedster shook his head. "No, I mean a big museum of villain things. We only keep the really dangerous stuff, like pieces of Brainiac and evil people possessing gems."

Shayera smiled. "Maybe you should make your own museum."

"What? Like a Flash Museum or something?" The mocking grin disappeared as he considered the concept. "Maybe that's not such a bad idea…" he said thoughtfully, scratching his chin.

"You _do _know I was joking, right?"

"W- Yeah… obviously…"

Shayera tried to suppress her laughter, and the Fastest Man Alive scowled. A smile spread across his face as he looked at the coin, then over to the dinosaur.

"Hey… how do you think Bats got these in here? You think he and Robin rolled 'em in?"

Shayera laughed. "They probably got Alfred to help them."

"Actually, I always thought I had a fairly sturdy lifting arm."

The pair turned to see Alfred with a tray of drinks. An amused smile on his face, he handed the tea to Shayera, and the coffee to Wally.

"Uh… thanks, Jeeves."

"You _could_ just call me Alfred, you know."

The scarlet speedster shrugged. "I know. But everyone else calls you Alfred. Where's the fun in that?"

A greying eyebrow shot up. "Touché." He half turned to leave, then paused. "If you need anything else, don't hesitate to ask."

Wally took a sip of his coffee and watched the butler go before he finally realised he needed something. "Hey, where's the, uh… little Bat's room?"

Shayera groaned, and Wally grinned. Alfred's face retained the same stony expression. "Next to where the costumes are kept."

After giving him a quick salute, Wally handed his coffee to Shayera, and sped to the bathroom. Alfred shook his head, smiling slightly as he went.

Shayera frowned as she looked around the cave. She hadn't been in here since…

She shook her head. Thinking like that didn't help anyone. But that still didn't help the fact that she felt ill at ease in this place, regardless of past circumstances. Something about the place felt so… cold. Still. She couldn't put her finger on it. Perhaps it was the fact that she couldn't see the clouds above her head… couldn't fly high. But she doubted that. There was something about Batman that could make her feel unsure and a little anxious. That feeling extended to his home. Shayera had no doubt that this was where Bruce spent the majority of his time; there was probably a bed in the cave somewhere, she was sure.

The huge trapdoor entrance to the cave lowered noisily, and the Batmobile came through shortly after. It slowed to a halt, and the canopy slid forward. A black haired boy dressed in red and black leapt from the car, a smile on his face that reminded Shayera of Wally. He faltered slightly as he saw her, but quickly recovered, the grin reappearing almost instantly.

"And you must be Shayera Hol," he said, coming forward with his hand extended. Bruce, meanwhile, had walked straight over to the computer, with only a small nod to Shayera as a greeting. She took the boy's hand as Wally came racing out of the bathroom.

"Man, that place is huge-! Oh, hey Robin. How's Bart?"

"He's fine. I wish he'd lay off the pranks once in a while, though."

Shayera looked at Wally with an eyebrow raised. "Chip of the old block, eh?"

"Robin, go upstairs and get dressed. If I'm not mistaken, you've got an essay to write." Batman turned in his chair. "Don't you?"

The Boy Wonder sighed. "Fine, fine, I'm going. Nice to see you guys!"

The pair waved him goodbye as he merrily jogged up the stairs, throwing off articles of clothing as he went. Wally grinned.

"Is he supposed to leave his clothes all over the place like that?"

"No," the Dark Knight responded, groaning. He tapped a few buttons on the computer, and a picture of the Mad Hatter appeared on the large screen. "From what I've found out, Tetch hasn't left his cell for quite some time. If he's using his mind control technology, he's finding some new way to do it."

"Couldn't it be natural? Like Grodd?" Shayera asked, handing Wally his coffee in front of Batman's face. He raised an eyebrow beneath his cowl and rested his head on his hand and stroked his chin thoughtfully.

"I'm not about to rule it out."

A noisy sip from Wally's mug attracted the attention of the two. "So what do we do now?"

"We go to Arkham and question him."

"And you waited for us? Bats, I'm touched."

Wally wasn't sure whether Bruce had heard or if he had simply learned to ignore his sense of humour. He hoped not; Bat-baiting was one of his favourite hobbies. The caped crusader headed for the Batmobile, and the canopy slid back upon his approach. He stopped before he got in.

"Are you two coming?"

The Fastest Man Alive's face broke out in a grin. "In that? Sure…"

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Stupid Bats not letting me in his stupid car because of his stupid paranoia about stupid Pac Man…"

Shayera grinned as she walked alongside her grumbling team-mate. She was glad he was getting his mind off of the Jinx business, at least for the moment. It didn't seem right to have Wally actingthat serious. Wally looked over at her.

"Are you okay here?"

"Why wouldn't I be?"

"I dunno… because of the whole Justice Lords thing? You were brought here when they injured you."

The red headed Thanagarian shook her head. "I don't remember that."

"Oh, okay. Never mind."

"But… thanks, Flash."

He shrugged, an embarrassed smile spreading across his face. Batman stopped them at the double doors.

"Before we go in, I think I should warn you that these people aren't your typical villains. They're psychotic and dangerous, even if they can't get their hands on you. Especially so, in some cases."

"Blah blah… I've handled psychos before, Bats," Flash quickly responded, walking forward. Bruce but a hand on his shoulder.

"Not like these, you haven't."

There was something in his tone of voice that made the scarlet speedster freeze in his tracks. Something that he rarely heard in Batman's voice. In fact, the only other time he could think of hearing it was when someone would threaten Diana. And of course, that one time in the Thanagarian ship when Wally had accidentallyblown up the north wall of Wayne Manor.

The Flash nodded slowly, and Batman let go of his shoulder. Pushing open the doors, Wally was surprised by the silence. At the Keystone City prison, Iron Heights, Wally had always left the place with his ears ringing from the inmates screaming abuse and other colourful euphemisms at him. The most popular one was to question his sexual adequacy, since he was the 'Fastest Man Alive'.

But here, there was nothing. Here he was, only a few seconds in, and he was already unnerved. They passed various booths on their way over to the Hatter's cell, passing by a man who looked like a giant crocodile, a woman cradling a potted plant, and a man with half of his face distorted.

Batman slowed slightly at his cell, then continued on. Wally was tempted to ask the Caped Crusader about the man's importance, but decided to leave it alone. It wasn't like Bats was likely to tell him, anyway. The Dark Knight stopped, and Flash assumed that they had arrived. Instead, they were at the Joker's cell. Except that there was no movement inside. The scarlet speedster looked in cautiously to see the Clown Prince of Crime sat in his straight jacket, staring forward blankly.

"What's up with him?" Wally whispered.

"I'll tell you what's up, buddy boy! Bat fart here turned that little Acey girl on my puddin'!" Wally turned to look at Harley Quinn, who was sat in the opposite cell. "Now he's nothin'. Not even a smile," she continued, and sniffled slightly.

Flash couldn't help but feel a little bit of sympathy for the girl. He shook his head and silently reminded himself that the adorable little girl was an absolute loon, too. Batman moved along to the next cell, and there sat Jervis Tetch, the Mad Hatter. All Wally could think about was how much he looked like a rat.

"Tetch."

The criminal suddenly looked up from his reading upon hearing the Dark Knight's voice. "Ah! Batman! To what do I owe the pleasure?" he stood suddenly, allowing his book to fall to the floor. Wally looked at the title.

_Alice in Wonderland. I didn't see that one coming._

"And you brought some friends, I see. The speedy one and the traitor woman."

Wally scowled. "Hey, sh-"

Shayera put a hand on his shoulder and shook her head. "It's okay, Flash. Leave him."

Tetch smiled. "Yes, yes, my boy, listen to your mother."

Batman intervened before Flash could do anything more. "We've found traces of your mind control devices in Metropolis, Tetch. You wouldn't know anything about that, would you?"

Something flashed across the criminals' eyes. "I'm afraid not."

"Is that right?"

Tetch sat on his bed and splayed his hands outwards. "I've been here for the past year or so. Although I'm not too sure about that; they won't give me a calendar in here, you know. I think I missed my birthday."

Bruce ignored his ramblings and continued on. "If we find any evidence linking you to this, we-"

"You'll what, Batman? Lock me up? A little late for that, isn't it? Besides," he said, smirking, "you can't threaten me in here. As long as I'm on this side of the glass, you can't touch me."

Batman smiled, and Tetch's instantly vanished. "Maybe I can't, but _he _can," he said, nodding over to Flash. To prove his companion's point, Wally vibrated his hand through the glass and then pulled it back again, a stony expression on his face the entire time. The Mad Hatter's eyes almost bulged out of their sockets.

"So how are we going to do this, Tetch? I know for a fact that you offended him quite a bit with that 'traitor' remark."

Tetch remained confident. "You're bluffing, Batman. You wouldn't dare touch me. You or your pet rabbit here."

Batman shrugged nonchalantly. "If you want to take that chance. But there's a reason he's called the fastest man alive. Most of the time we can't stop him before he does something… unfortunate." He leaned closer, as if sharing some great secret with Tetch. "What do you think happened to the Joker?"

His cocky demeanour quickly fading, the Hatter looked from Batman to Flash, and then back again. "But… but..."

"And besides… Even if _he _doesn't do anything, he could always bring me in with him." His voice lowered to the barest of whispers. "And you _know _how much _I _dislike you."

Wally cracked his knuckles. "What's it gonna be, pal?"

The sweat was pouring from his forehead. "Guard! G-"

"I don't think that'll do you much good," Shayera interrupted. "The guard met with an unfortunate accident on the way in."

Flash turned to Batman. "You said to go for the teeth first, right?"

The Dark Knight nodded grimly, and Wally turned back towards Tetch, the same stony look on his face. Inwardly, Wally was grinning inanely.

_I've gotta play bad cop more often._

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Tetch had sung like a bird before Wally had even gotten fully into the cell, a fact he was partly disappointed and relieved at. He seriously doubted he would have been able to do anything to the guy. Unfortunately, Tetch had been telling the truth; he didn't know anything about his technology being used, but he _did _tell Batman where he had stored his mind control technology; beneath the building where he used to work.

Before he went loopy, that is.

Shayera knocked down the locked door with her mace, sending it crashing to the floor loudly, a cloud of dust billowing out from underneath it. Wally squinted to see in the dim light, and was suddenly blinded as Batman flipped on a small torch.

"Yow!"

Bruce ignored his protestations and entered the room. Under the inquisitive light of the torch, Wally could see that the room was a wreck; tables overturned, cabinets ripped open, and a giant gaping hole in the ceiling.

"Almost as if something tore through…" Shayera said absentmindedly, and Wally nodded in agreement.

"Someone's not a fan, that's for sure."

Batman turned and looked at him. "Have a look around the area; this could have been recent."

"Gotcha," Flash responded, giving a quick salute before shooting out the door. Shayera and Batman got to searching.

Shayera crouched down to look under a table. "So what do you know about this 'Jinx'?" she asked, without even looking up.

"What makes you think I know anything about her?"

The Thanagarian didn't respond, her silence being enough. If he were anyone else, he would have sighed at the futility of denying it. She could read people about as well as he could. Better, in fact. She _had _figured out his secret identity, after all.

"She's an old enemy of the Titans'."

"And?"

"And that's it."

"That's not what I mean. How does she know Flash?" she asked impatiently, still being careful to protect identities in case someone was listening in.

"He helped her out of the criminal organisation she worked for."

"The HIVE," Shayera said as she stood, heading over to the toppled cabinet.

Batman nodded and flipped through a few files. "Anything?"

She frowned in frustration. "No. Whoever did this took everything important, and didn't leave anything behind."

Bruce was silent for a moment. "Or maybe not…"

Shayera turned in time to see Batman lifting a toppled chair.

"What is it?"

Batman pointed to the floor, indicating a small puddle of red, with remnants of smashed glass poking out from beneath the crimson liquid.

"Blood? Could it be Tetch?"

Bruce shook his head as he dabbed some of the blood up. "It's still wet; too recent. Tetch hasn't been here for months." He put the sample in a plastic evidence bag and slid it into a waiting slot on his utility belt. "I'll take this sample back with us and run some scans."

Shayera nodded and looked to the hole in the roof. "Was there something between Flash and Jinx? Something personal?"

"She left the HIVE because of him."

"Is that a yes?"

"It's an observation," Batman corrected, and then paused. As he spoke, his voice became quieter, gentler. "People don't leave criminal organisations easily. Especially where the HIVE is concerned. For her to leave, she must have had a very good reason waiting for her on the other side."

Shayera looked at the Dark Knight, her mind slowly taking in his words. Wally suddenly zipped into the room behind her.

"Couldn't find anyone, Bats. Just an old lady, and I don't think she did this."

Bruce nodded. "All right. Let's head back."

He strode out the room quickly, and Wally had to move fast to get out of his way. He looked over at Shayera, who was still looking at the place where Batman was stood.

"Shayera? You okay?"

She shook her head and smiled. "Sorry. Yeah, let's go."

"I heard you guys talking. Talk about anything interesting?"

Shayera waved a dismissive hand. "Oh, just stalker Hawkman stuff. The usual."

The Fastest Man Alive cocked an eyebrow beneath his mask and smiled unsurely. "Uh… okay."

He sped away, and Shayera quickly flew after him, following the Batmobile back to the cave. She watched her speedster friend from a distance, wondering what else he kept from her and the rest of the League behind that grin.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"I really need a Flash computer."

Batman raised an eyebrow. "A what?"

"A Flash computer. And a Flash cave would be cool, too. I already have a Flash van, though, so I guess I could just call that the Flashmobile."

"A Flash van?" Shayera asked incredulously.

Wally nodded. "Didn't GL tell you?"

"I thought he was joking."

Batman tapped a few buttons on the computer. "It sounds like one." He turned to look at Wally. "Why do you need a van?" He paused. "Don't answer that."

"Kinda creepy that GL said the same thing, isn't it?" Flash replied, grinning. The computer made a noise indicating it was done with its scan. Batman punched a few keys, bringing up the image of a particularly surly looking man wearing a sailor hat.

"Popeye wants to control people's minds?" he said, his voice an aghast whisper.

Shayera looked over at him and shook her head, an amused smile on her face. Batman just scowled.

"His name is Bibbo Bibbowski."

A red eyebrow shot up, and the smile disappeared from Shayera's face. "Isn't that one of Superman's friends?"

The Dark Knight nodded. "One of his informants."

The scarlet speedster frowned, his crimson mask wrinkling. "But why would he be in Gotham?"

"And why would he be stealing advanced mind control technology?" Bruce added, stroking his chin in thought.

"Well, only one way to find out," Shayera cut in, putting her hand to her ear. "Mr Terrific, we're ready for pickup." Shayera nodded at Batman. "Thanks for the help."

The caped crusader nodded. Wally made a mock pistol with his hand. "Thanks, Bats," he said, winking as they dematerialised in a flash of blue light. Batman shook his head and got back to finding out what the Riddler's latest clue meant.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

As the pair rematerialised on the teleporter platform, they were almost immediately knocked off by Green Lantern and Supergirl.

"Whoa! What's going on?" Flash asked, dashing out of the way. John stopped on the platform.

"There's been a break in at a Wayne Tech facility in Coast City."

"Your neck of the woods, isn't it?" Shayera asked.

The Green Lantern nodded grimly. "I'll see you later."

And with that, the two disappeared in two towers of blue light. Flash looked up at the control station where Mr Terrific was sat.

"Mr Terrific! Two for Metropolis, hold the lettuce, extra cheese!"

The super intelligent hero frowned. "What?"

Wally was about to reiterate when Shayera put a hand on his shoulder. "Two to Metropolis."

"Why didn't you just say so?"

The Fastest Man Alive gained a scowl and quickly zoomed on to the teleporter pad. Shayera hovered over and landed gracefully next to him. Wally crossed his arms in a huff.

"It was a good joke."

Shayera laughed as they were engulfed by blue light.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

(A/N: Again, not much to say, except review!)


	4. Colleagues at Work

Disclaimer: I don't own _Justice League Unlimited._ We _are_ getting new episodes in the UK though. _'Flash and Substance' _on the 16th! Woo Hoo!

_**Connections**_

_**Chapter Four: Colleagues at Work**_

As Wally West was led through the rotating doors into the foyer of _The Daily Planet_, the only thing he could think was how much his fellow Leaguer looked like a dork.

_A very big dork who's more powerful than a locomotive, Wally. Whatever a locomotive is. Look, just keep your mouth shut._

"You know, you kinda look like a dork like that."

_What happened to keeping your mouth shut?_

Clark just smiled as he turned to look at Wally. "I _am _a dork, Wally." A jet black eyebrow rose. "Didn't you know that by now?"

The scarlet speedster shrugged, an easy grin on his face. "Nah, you're a boy scout. A dork's completely different."

"How's that?"

Wally paused. "Actually, they're not. Boy Scouts _are_ dorks. But still, I had no idea you were such a…" He cast his gaze upwards as he contemplated the right words.

"Farm boy?"

Wally snapped his fingers and smiled in agreement. "Farm boy, that's it." He paused for a moment. "Have you been called that before?"

A shrug was the Man of Steel's only response. They reached the elevator and Clark pushed the button.

"Wally, before we go up, I just want a few things to be clear. One: just try and be quiet. Two: please try and keep people away from the subject of how we met, unless you can think of something really good. Three-"

"All right, all right," Wally said, rolling his green eyes. "It's not like I don't have a secret identity myself, you know."

Clark didn't respond; he just gave him a 'yeah right' look as the doors opened. He politely stepped aside for the people exiting while Wally pushed his way through into the elevator. The mild mannered reporter stepped in, a slight scowl on his face as he pushed the button.

"You could show some more manners, you know."

The red headed speedster shrugged. "They wouldn't for me."

"That's not the p-" Clark stopped himself and sighed. "Never mind."

"Look, Clark, they aren't exactly the most polite people in Central and Keystone. If you nicely step aside to let people get on the bus before you, you don't get on."

A wry smile crossed the Man of Tomorrow's lips. "Since when do you get a bus?"

"Since I started getting tired without food."

Clark frowned. "Why don't you have food?"

"Being a mechanic doesn't exactly pay enough for my dietary needs. And I can't just run over to the Metro Tower every time I want some food. Bats has already had some words with me about that."

Before the Big Blue Boy Scout could respond, the elevator doors opened. Clark waved Wally in, and the Fastest Man Alive couldn't help but feel in awe. Even the Metro Tower and the Watchtower didn't get this busy. He suddenly felt a little slower. He looked over at his colleague, who was smiling at Wally's awe.

"So where's your desk?"

"What's this, Smallville? 'Bring your friends to work' day?"

Wally turned to see a raven haired beauty standing before him. His mind worked over several different lines he could use, all of them losing their effect when he wasn't in his Flash costume. He opened his mouth to speak when Clark put a hand on his shoulder.

"This is Wally. He's interested in working for the newspaper in his city, so he came here to get a taste of what it's like."

The red headed speedster sighed and extended his hand. "Wally West. Pleased to meet you."

"Lois Lane."

Wally's eyes widened slightly.

_You moron. You were about to hit on Supes' girl. In FRONT OF SUPES._

"Erm… nice to meet you," he said, laughing nervously.

"Right…" Lois responded, looking over at Clark with an eyebrow raised. He just smiled and shrugged. She turned back to look at Wally, a polite smile on her face. "Okay, well… I'll see you later, Wally."

"Yeah, sure."

With a shake of her head and small laugh, she continued on her way to the elevator. The Man of Steel looked back at Wally, a smile on his face.

"Didn't realise it was Lois, did you?"

Wally shook his head.

"Scared you, huh?"

Wally nodded his head, and Clark laughed. The Fastest Man Alive shook his head and scowled. "Look, can we just find this Bonko guy? Does he work here or what?"

"Bibbo," Clark corrected, "and no, he doesn't. I'm just here to finish up before we hit the town."

Flash's shoulder's drooped slightly. "Work? You brought me here for work?"

"If I remember right, you insisted on coming with me. You could have always waited on the roof with Shayera."

"Yeah, but she keeps on snooping around. Besides, it's cold up there."

Clark raised a dark eyebrow as he sat at his desk. "Snooping? About what?"

"This whole Jinx thing," Wally replied quickly, then grimaced at his loose mouth.

"What Jinx thing?"

The red headed speedster sighed and leant on Clark's desk. He folded his arms in front of him. "It doesn't matter."

"Wally. What Jinx thing?"

"Look, it's personal, all right? Could you just finish your work so we can get out of here?"

Clark seemed slightly taken aback by the sudden outburst, and more than a little bit hurt. Wally hated that about him. He could look like a five year old boy sometimes, especially when someone he cared about yelled at him. Clark nodded and silently got back to his work at the computer. Wally was silent for the duration of the workload, trying to ignore the 'subtle' glances Clark was giving him as he typed on the computer. After about thirty minutes, he finally snapped.

"Are you done yet?"

The Man of Steel smiled. "I was waiting for that. Almost done, Wally."

He tapped away on the keys for a few minutes more, then turned off the computer. "Okay, let's go," he said, getting up from his chair whilst grabbing his coat.

Wally hopped off the desk. "That's it?"

"That's it."

"Huh. Being a journalist must be easier than I thought."

Little did Wally know that Clark had nowhere near finished his article.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Everyone was now dressed in their uniforms, which made Wally feel a little more comfortable. There was something strange and unnerving about seeing Superman, the strongest man in the world, dressed up as some farm boy dork from Kansas. Superman knocked on the door a few times, and Shayera turned to Wally.

"Have fun?"

Flash shrugged. "Kinda. A little boring, but… it was very Supes."

Shayera raised a reddish eyebrow. "Are you implying that Superman is boring?"

"I wouldn't dare. Especially since he's got super hearing."

The Thanagarian Leaguer ceased her questioning and slowly turned to look at Superman, who was still knocking on the door.

"Bibbo? It's Superman. Are you there?"

They had tried the many bars that Bibbo frequented, but had still come up with nothing. Eventually, they had decided to go to his apartment.

"Why don't you just X-ray it, Supes?"

The Man of Tomorrow stopped his knocking and looked over at them, looking slightly embarrassed. "I did that once, and he was..." he cleared his throat and leaned closer, lowering his voice to the tiniest of whispers. "…naked."

Wally and Shayera groaned and exchanged disgusted 'ew' looks, and Clark's blush intensified. Seeing this, the pair tried to fight their smiles.

"I think you'll have to take the risk, Superman," Shayera said, trying her best to sound official. He sighed and nodded, turning to the wall. He squinted and frowned. Or maybe he had to frown for his X-ray vision to work, Wally wasn't sure. That thought worried him, because Clark had frowned at him plenty of times. Did that mean he was x-raying him? Flash shook the disturbing thought from his head as Superman spoke.

"He's not in there, but the place is a wreck. It looks like he put up one hell of a fight," he said, scanning back and forth. He stopped at the door. He cut off his x-ray vision and walked over to it. Cautiously turning the knob, he pushed forward gently and the door opened.

Wally and Shayera exchanged a curious glance and followed him into the room. Clark was already scanning the room for clues as they came in.

"Get searching."

_Great. A search._

Wally rolled his eyes beneath his crimson mask. He really hated looking for vital clues. He never found anything of any value because he had no idea what he was looking for. It was one aspect of being a superhero that he didn't-

Wally frowned as he spotted a wallet on the floor, covered by a piece of torn material.

_Hey… that's not Bonky's picture…_

He picked up the wallet and looked in more detail. He grinned.

"Hey guys," he said, smirking, "_I _found something."

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

There was a silence on the other end as Batman searched for the name on his computer. The wallet belonged to someone called Eric Spiegel. Shayera had guessed that Bibbo had ripped it (and its pocket) from Eric when he was abducted. Clark had suggested running the name through the Metro Tower computer, but once there, Batman seemed like a better idea to Wally. If anyone would know random thugs, it'd be Batman. The deep voice of the Dark Knight interrupted his thoughts.

"_Eric Spiegel. Used to work for Rupert Thorne. He went to work for another organisation a few months ago. Word is that the group's moved to another city."_

Shayera leant forward over Flash's shoulder to look at the monitor. "Do you know which city?"

Batman nodded. _"Bludhaven."_

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Wally waved Shayera into the apartment as he took a seat on the sofa. She stepped in unsurely, looking at Flash with more than a little scepticism. She closed the door behind her.

"I don't think this was a good idea."

Flash waved a dismissive hand. "Ah, don't worry so much; he'll be fine with it."

"No, I mean us making ourselves comfortable. I don't mind the breaking and entering part."

The Fastest Man Alive grinned, when his expression suddenly changed. "Hey, I wonder what food he's got in here…"

"I don't think-"

A red blur shot past her into the kitchen.

"-he'd appreciate that."

She heard some commotion coming from the kitchen as plates clattered and Wally stuffed his face.

"Don't worry about it, Shayera. I used to take his food all the time. He won't care, trust me." There was a brief silence. "Ooo, beer. What the hell is that? AAAAH!"

Shayera's head whipped around. "Flash?"

The scarlet speedster backed out of the kitchen. "Something in his fridge just tried to bite me."

"Bite you?"

He nodded rapidly, but then smiled. "I managed to get these, though," he said, pulling out two bottles of beer. He thrust one into her hands, and she looked down at it, considering the implications of drinking on duty. She smiled and shrugged, following Wally's cue, taking a seat on the surprisingly comfortable sofa. The Flash raised his bottle.

"Here's to Dick not getting home anytime soon."

She raised her bottle and clinked it against his. They both took a sip and sat in silence for a few minutes before Shayera felt the urge to break it.

"So you used to take his food all the time, huh?"

A grin spread over the speedster's face. "Yep."

"When was that? When you were with the Titans?"

"Nah. Well, I _did _when I was with the Titans, but that mostly Cyborg's food. I took Dick's food when we were in college together."

She slowly ducked her head in disbelief. "You were in college together?"

He nodded, taking a sip of his beer. "Yeah – Gotham College. Not for long, though – I uh… had to leave."

"Why?"

"I had, uh… business in Central City," he said cryptically, looking around the room in an effort to avoid her gaze.

"Wally, why can't you just tell me about these things? You can trust me."

He was looking increasingly uncomfortable, but he didn't make any move to get up. He took another sip of his beer and shrugged.

"It's… a different part of my life. You guys… you, John, Supes, Bats… you just don't belong there, y'know? I wasn't the same person then that I am now, I…" He let out a heavy sigh. "…I made a lot of stupid mistakes."

"So? I don't care. You may not have noticed, Wally, but I _have _made mistakes before."

He offered a weak smile. "I guess."

"So? Are you going to tell me about Jinx now? Or do I grill Dick for information when he gets here?"

Shayera wished she knew what was going on behind those green eyes. Dozens of emotions boiled beneath the surface, and a troubled frown creased Wally's face. He opened his mouth to speak when the door opened. Dick stepped through the doorway, a paper bag full of groceries tucked under one arm. He paused as he saw them, then smiled.

"Jesus… you guys scared the crap out of me."

Wally grinned. "Did you expect anything less from me?"

Dick set down the bag and thought for a moment. "No." He walked over and shook Shayera's hand. "Nice to see you again. Help yourself to the beers," he said, a wry smile on his face.

"Oh, I didn't-"

Wally cut in quickly, smiling the whole time. "That was my idea."

"Should have known."

"And _what _the hell is that thing in the refrigerator that almost ate my arm?"

Dick frowned for a moment, then suddenly burst out laughing. "Oh, _that_. That was something Kori cooked up for me about a month ago."

"A _month_ ago?"

"Yeah, it _was _her attempt at an apple pie. But I got busy, and then… well, you saw."

The two friends shared a laugh, and Dick took the opportunity to take the beer from Wally. He made a quick noise of protest, but Shayera stopped him before he could retaliate.

"I think we should tell Dick why we're here."

The scarlet speedster snapped his fingers and smiled. "Oh, right, yeah." He turned back to Dick, who was looking at the two of them with a curious eyebrow cocked. "You know someone called… uh…?" he looked back at Shayera for support.

"Eric Spiegel," she finished, taking another sip of her beer to rub it in Wally's face. Dick's face darkened as he nodded.

"One of Blockbuster's men. Why?"

"We think he's got something to do with Jinx."

Dick looked over to Wally in surprise.

"Jinx? She's alive?"

Wally shrugged. "Looks like it. I was pretty surprised too, considering you told me she was dead."

"I thought she was."

"Did you find her body?"

"No, but-"

Wally threw his arms up in the air. "Then how do you classify that as dead!"

"Look, Wally, you weren't there. You didn't see the explosion. Trust me; anybody who _was_ inside would have been incinerated."

"And yet, she's still alive."

Shayera placed a hand on her speedster friend's shoulder. "Calm down, Wally."

He looked back at her, and his expression softened. He turned back to Dick, his eyes downward.

"Dick, I'm sorry. It's just-"

"Don't worry about it. I know how you felt about her."

Shayera's eyes widened as she looked over at Wally, whose expression hardened.

"Let's just find this guy, okay?"

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dick, now dressed as the costumed crime fighter Nightwing, ran from rooftop to rooftop, flanked by Shayera and Wally, who was going slower than usual so as not to overtake Dick and get lost. Which had happened so many times he couldn't count. Nightwing came to a halt on a rooftop and walked to the ledge. On the other side of the street was a small, dirty looking bar called _'The Watering Hole'_.

"Original," Shayera commented, and Dick couldn't help the small smile that appeared on his face. He had thought the same thing when he had first seen it.

"All right, it's just about closing time, so the bartender will be coming out soon. Just let me do this, okay?"

As if on cue, a large man came out of the bar, locking the door behind him before heading off down the street. Nightwing leapt from the ledge and extended his gliding wings, gracefully swooping down to street level and behind the bartender.

"Jerry."

The bartender whirled on his heel in panic, his gun at the ready. Wally was down there before Dick could even do anything. A red blur smacked into Jerry, sending him into the wall hard. His gun fell and Flash kicked it away.

"What are you doing? I told you I'd handle this!" Dick yelled, kneeling down next to the groaning bartender. "You okay, Jerry?"

Wally's jaw dropped. "Wait… you know this guy? In a _good _way?"

Nightwing didn't even respond, keeping his attention on Jerry. "Anything broken?"

"Don't think so," he said groggily. "If there is, I'm sending the bill to the Justice League, pal," he said, pointing sharply in Wally's direction.

"Sorry, I didn't-"

"Just leave it alone, Flash. Jerry, I need to ask you about a guy called Eric Spiegel."

As he spoke to Jerry, Shayera landed next to Wally. She roughly grabbed his shoulder. "What did you think you were doing?"

"He had a gun, I thought-"

"You don't think he can handle one man with a gun?"

"No, I mean… yeah, I _know _he can handle a guy with a gun, it's just…" the scarlet speedster trailed off unsurely, avoiding Shayera's penetrating stare.

"You need to sort out whatever's rattling around in there," she said, knocking on his head with her fist. "Or you'll end up getting yourself killed."

Dick, meanwhile, was finished talking to Jerry. "Thanks, Jerry. Same payment as always, right?"

"Yeah, right. See you round, kid."

Nightwing gave him a nod and turned back to Flash and Shayera. Wally put a hand to his head as Jerry paced away quickly.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to-"

Dick raised a hand to silence him. "It's okay. You're feeling angry. I get it."

"What've you got?" Shayera asked, hooking her mace back onto her belt. Dick frowned in thought.

"Jerry says that Spiegel disappeared a few months ago. Someone dressed in robes came to collect him. They started talking about 'going where the stars can be seen at their brightest'."

Flash frowned beneath his mask. "That's kinda weird."

Shayera scratched her chin. "'Where the stars can be seen at their brightest'… what could that mean?"

Nightwing shrugged. "Somewhere high up?"

"How about an observatory?" Wally suggested.

There was a silence as the two looked over at the speedster.

"What? I'm not as stupid as you guys think I am."

Shayera turned back to Nightwing. "Is there an observatory in Bludhaven?"

"No. The closest is in Gotham."

Wally's shoulders slumped. "Back to Gotham _again_?"

Shayera smiled and shook her head. "No, we'll just get Batman to check it out. We'll go to the observatory that's closest after Gotham."

Dick frowned, which prompted a similarly negative response from Wally. "What is it?" he asked in a tired tone of voice.

The ex-Boy Wonder sighed. "You're not going to like it."

A red eyebrow rose on Shayera's face. "Why?"

"It's in Jump City."

"That's where Titans Tower is, right?"

Both nodded, frowns of equal displeasure on their faces.

"So what's the problem?"

Wally's entire face widened in shock. "Oh no… _she's _not there, is she?"

Dick took a long, deep breath. "Last time I checked, it's her turn to be watching over the tower, yeah."

Flash buried his face in his hands. "Oh, no… I don't wanna do this now…"

"Do _what _now?" Shayera asked impatiently, looking from one to the other.

Dick put a hand on his shoulder. "You need to make amends anyway. This'll give you the chance. Besides, we could use her help in finding Jinx."

"_Who's _help?" Shayera blurted out, a scowl breaking out on her face.

The Fastest Man Alive's head jumped up to look at him. "Waitaminnit… 'we'?"

Nightwing nodded. "I'm coming with you. I told you she was dead; I was wrong. I need to make that up to you. Besides, things are slow in Bludhaven at the moment."

Flash's demeanour changed instantly into one of excitement. "All right! It'll be just like old times!" he said, pumping the air with his fist. "Well, what are we waiting for? Let's go!"

He zipped off down the road, and stopped at the turning when he saw that they weren't following.

"C'mon, guys!"

Shayera looked at Dick, whose face simply held an amused smile.

"Could you please tell me what just happened? Because I have no clue."

His smile grew. "When you're working with him, you have to expect that."

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

(A/N: I don't think it's _too _hard to guess which Titan they're talking about, but who knows; maybe I'll surprise some of y'all.

Anyhoo, review.)


	5. Old Pains

Disclaimer: I don't own _Justice League Unlimited_, _Teen Titans_, or any of the characters, places blah blah blah BLAH.

_**Connections**_

_**Chapter Five: Old Pains**_

The Dark Knight's voice was tinny over the comm system. _"I checked out the observatory. I didn't see anything unusual."_

Shayera nodded. "Okay; thanks for the help. Javelin, out."

The city looked exactly the same from the sky. Of course, Wally had been here at ground level just two weeks ago to see Bart, but down there, it bore little resemblance to the city he had helped defend as Kid Flash. But from the sky… it was like he had never left. He looked over at Dick, and couldn't help but smile. He was thinking the exact same thing. Of course, the ex-Boy Wonder had a stronger attachment to the city than he did; he had lived here for God knows how long, defending it and living in the T Tower long before Wally and the other Titans had come along. Before he and Jinx had joined.

Shayera pushed a few buttons, setting the comm to the Titans frequency. A part of the scarlet speedster didn't want anyone to answer. He wasn't looking forward to seeing her again; to having to deal with it. After a few seconds, a face appeared on the small monitor in front of Shayera.

And there she was, clear as day.

"Titans Tower."

Shayera cocked an eyebrow.

"This is Shayera Hol. I've got Nightwing and the Flash-" something passed over the girl's pale face, and Shayera paused, but then opted to continue. "-with me. We're here on League business. Could we land?"

The girl pushed a few buttons off screen, then nodded. "Aerial defences down. You're clear to land."

"Thank you."

Shayera carefully manoeuvred the sleek jet, landing it with honed precision on the designated area of the roof. As she unbuckled her seatbelt and stood, she noticed that Wally was looking increasingly uncomfortable. They walked down the ramp and onto the roof of the T Tower in silence. Raven was waiting for them at the door.

Nightwing offered a small wave, and Shayera gave a respectful nod. Raven acknowledged with a polite smile. She didn't seem to look at Flash though. If Shayera didn't know better, she could have sworn that she was slightly nervous. But everything she'd heard about the dark empath seemed to indicate that she hardly ever showed any kind of emotion. Wally was similarly unresponsive. Shayera elbowed him in the gut. He smiled nervously and offered a small wave.

"Uh… hi… Raven…" He paused. "How are you doing?"

She tucked some hair behind her ear, and threw a cursory glance over at the scarlet speedster. "Fine. You?"

He nodded quickly, obviously wanting this conversation over as quickly as possible. "I'm good, I'm good."

She nodded back. "Good."

"Good."

Shayera watched this incredibly fast exchange with fascination painted on her features. She looked over at Dick, who had a similar look on his face. She leaned over to whisper to him conspiratorially.

"Have they always been like this?"

He shook his head. "Not always. It's only since-" he stopped himself in mid sentence, and cleared his throat. "…uh, but I shouldn't be telling you about that."

Before Shayera could respond, he had stepped forward and between Wally and Raven.

"Shall we go in?" Nightwing asked, walking towards the door to lead them downstairs. Raven, grateful for a reason to leave, quickly pursued. Flash seemed ready to follow when Shayera put a cautionary hand on his arm.

"Wally… who is she?"

"She's, uh… Raven?" he offered, wincing at the poor response.

Shayera rolled her eyes. "Who is she to _you_, Wally?"

The Fastest Man Alive coughed and shifted his weight from one foot to the other, his hands nervously knotted behind his back. "She's… my ex girlfriend."

He shot down the stairway after Nightwing. The red haired Thanagarian stood in shock before walking towards the door.

"Another one…?"

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dick resisted the urge to shiver as he looked around the abandoned observatory. Even though Professor Chang had long since been removed, this place still felt cold, sterile… haunting. He couldn't help but think of the poor souls that Chang had experimented on… poked, prodded… tortured.

Raven closed her eyes and put her hand to her forehead in concentration. The wind whistled angrily as it blew through the thin gap where the telescope would usually go. In a bizarre move, the observatory had been rebuilt, but no new telescope had been built with it. It was like it was just for show for the tourists. Raven walked over to the other end of the observatory, checking for any kind of 'mental fingerprints' left behind. Wally nervously walked over to her, his hands behind his back.

She looked exactly as she had all those years ago, except a little bit more…mature. The part of his brain that was still Kid Flash couldn't help but make his eyes wander a little. He mentally slapped himself, remembering that Raven was an empath.

"So, uh… how are things at the Tower?"

The dark empath paused before responding, never once acting like she had stopped searching. "They're fine."

"And… you're doing okay… I mean, you look…" he paused. "…healthy."

She sighed. "I'm fine, W- Flash."

The Fastest Man Alive was silent at her slip of the tongue. She still felt the urge to call him by his real name. That was good, right?

Dick couldn't help but pity Wally as he vainly attempted to make some kind of conversation with Raven. He was surprised that he was getting any response out of her at all. But then again, if anyone could consistently surprise her, it was Raven. The same was true of Wally, actually. Only _he _could do what he did to Raven and not be murdered by her as a result. Of course, it wasn't as though it was entirely _his _fault. She had played a significant hand in it as well.

Shayera broke his concentration.

"How long were they together?"

He paused before responding, crossing his arms. "Who said they were together?"

"Flash did."

"Oh. Well. It wasn't for long." He looked at the two, and if he wasn't wearing his mask, Shayera would have seen his eyes glaze over slightly. "They _were_ happy together, though. It was the only time I'd ever seen Raven laugh on a daily basis."

"What happened?" she asked, keeping her eyes on the silent pair as they walked around the observatory. Wally looked like a puppy that had misbehaved, with his eyes all mopey and his arms behind his back sheepishly as he followed Raven around the dark room. Dick sighed.

"I don't think… I should be the one telling you."

"But he _won't _tell me. That's the problem."

"Then ask Raven."

Shayera titled her head, her eyes half closed incredulously. "Funny. What happened?"

"Look… I can't, all right? It's-" he let out a frustrated breath. "It's not my place to."

Shayera was about to reply when Raven and Wally approached.

"I'm not getting anything. No-one's been here for… wait." She was silent again.

"Raven?"

She nodded. "There _was _something here… but it's so well hidden, I almost missed it. I…" she sighed, letting her arms drop in exasperation. "I can't concentrate here. We'll have to go back to the Tower."

Nightwing nodded, and Raven floated away, encapsulating him in black energy for the journey back to the Tower. Flash and Shayera were left stood in the observatory alone. Shayera rubbed her arms in a vain attempt to keep warm.

"See you back at the Tower?" she said, pushing herself off the ground. Flash didn't respond.

"Flash?"

He looked up at her absentmindedly. "Hmm…? Oh, yeah. I'm coming."

The Thanagarian paused briefly. "Just what happened between you two?"

"I… really should back to the Tower."

He sped away, and all that Shayera could see was a red blur creating waves over the water. With a sigh and a shake of her head, she beat her wings to give herself some momentum, and flew back to the Tower.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

His large, hairy grey fingers tapped against one another as he contemplated the situation. The Key and Livewire had been promptly broken out of their prison. Livewire he wasn't too concerned with, but the Key was a valuable member of his group, and one of the few he could trust without the use of force. It was their capture that had brought this situation to his attention. The doors to the conference room opened, and Lex Luthor stepped through.

"I'm finished with the modifications to the Key's weaponry. It'll need testing, but…" he trailed off as he realised Grodd wasn't giving him his full attention.

"I'm sorry, am I boring you?"

The super intelligent gorilla looked up at him with that smug look he always had. "I heard every word, Lex. Just because human males can't multi task, you assume that _all _males can't." He smiled slightly wider, his teeth showing slightly. "How typical of you, Lex."

The bald criminal simply smiled as he took a seat. "And what has you so enraptured, may I ask?"

Grodd activated the holographic generator embedded in the center of the table. Floating in mid air was an image of the Flash, Shayera Hol, and two that Lex didn't recognise standing in a darkened observatory. He looked over at the gorilla.

"Is there something more to this, or am I going to have to guess?"

And there was the smug look again. "You may recall that we received an anonymous tip a few days ago. It concerned some high level, classified CADMUS technology being kept in a warehouse in Central City."

"Not a particularly convincing place for a black ops government agency to put their technology."

Grodd raised a finger in protest. "The most valuable treasures are hidden in plain sight, Lex. In any case, I believed it was worth the risk, and sent the Key and Livewire to retrieve it. However, whether by accident or by design, two Justice League members prevented the robbery." He leaned forward conspiratorially. "Now, Lex. Hazard a guess as to which two members of the League I am referring to."

Lex raised a curious eyebrow, and glanced over at the holographic image. Grodd nodded.

"So far, they've been to Gotham, Metropolis, and Bludhaven. And I'm beginning to wonder what kind of hunt they're on."

"Who are the other two?"

Grodd zoomed in on the image until only the two mystery characters remained.

"The man with the blue markings on his chest is called Nightwing. He has some kind of past relationship with Batman, although I have yet to discern it. The girl in the robe is named Raven. Both have been members of the superhero group called the 'Teen Titans'."

"Are they still a part of that group?"

"I'm guessing that Nightwing isn't, since he is commonly seen lurking in the shadows of Bludhaven. Raven, however, is rarely seen _without_ her team-mates."

Lex nodded, rubbing his chin in thought. "I see… and why does this concern you?"

"Redirection, Lex. If the League is concentrating on this operation, then they are less likely to see ours. And besides…" he said, changing the hologram to focus on the Flash. "I owe _him _something special."

"So what are you going to do? Send another two blunderers after them?"

"Nothing so unsightly, Lex. There are four of them, each of them highly skilled. For a task this difficult, I need the best." He pushed a few buttons, and activated a comm signal.

"Who?" Luthor enquired, a quizzical eyebrow raised. As if in response, a shadowy figure appeared on the hologram in front of them. He was sat in a chair that wasn't facing them. All that Lex could see was his right side.

"Yes?"

His voice would have made Lex shudder if he were a weaker man. There was a coldness in his voice that he had heard in few others. He counted himself among them.

Grodd smiled. "I have a job for you."

The shadowy figure was silent for a moment. "You may or may not have heard, but I'm not in that line of work anymore."

"Yes, I know. You simply sit alone, rotting away, while your invaluable skills go to waste. You refused me when I offered you a place in my… organisation. Now, I'm merely asking for one job. A job I need doing well."

Lex leaned over towards Brainiac. "Can you see him?" he whispered, hoping that Grodd wasn't listening. Brainiac's facial expression remained the same.

"No."

"Do you recognise him, at least?"

"No."

Lex scowled and turned back to the transmission. "And you're supposed to be a repository of all knowledge…?"

The man spoke again.

"I'm not interested."

Grodd's smile changed. Luthor had seen that face before. It was when the gorilla had the upper hand, and when he knew it was so. He had seen it many times before.

"I think you will be… once you see the targets."

The man turned to look at them, but Lex was no closer to deciphering his image.

"I'm listening."

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Azarath, Metrion, Zinthos…"

Raven was floating in the air, cross legged as she faced the large windows that looked out over the city. Shayera watched with some degree of fascination as she sat at the large dinner table. There was something peaceful and soothing about the watching her chanting. It was similar to when she would watch Dr Fate casting spells. A certain degree of peace would wash over her.

_Tranquil. _

Wally and Dick, meanwhile, were stood over by the kitchen area, having a cup of Cyborg brand coffee.

"He really makes the beans himself?"

Dick shrugged. "I think it's some kind of synthetic stuff. Doesn't taste as good, but it means he can have pre-programmed drinks."

A red eyebrow rose. "What d'you mean?"

"Well… look." Dick pointed to buttons going all the way down the machine. Each one had a name on it. "For Raven's button, it synthesises herbal tea. For Garfield, hot chocolate. And for Kori…."

Wally leant forward and read the button. "'Mustard coffee'?" The two made a simultaneous 'bleah' face, letting their tongues hang out of their mouths. They took another sip of their coffees, and looked over at the meditating Raven.

"What did you talk about?"

Flash looked over at him, a quizzical eyebrow raised.

"At the observatory, I mean."

The red headed speedster nodded and quickly spoke. "Oh. Well. Nothing much. I asked how things in the Tower were and she said they were good. Then I asked how she was, and she said she was fine. She almost called me Wally though. That's a good thing, right?"

Dick was blinded by the sudden influx of information. He blinked once or twice, then shook his head. "I guess." He looked back over at the dark empath, taking another sip of his coffee. His eyes drifted over to Shayera, who seemed to be drifting away, simply staring into her drink.

"And what about her?" Dick asked, nodding towards Shayera.

"Huh?"

"What have you told her?"

The Flash shifted his weight from one foot to the other at super speed, making him look like an out of control metronome. Nightwing put a hand on his shoulder to make him stop.

"Wally. Calm down."

"Okay. Sorry."

"So? What have you told her?"

"Nothing much. She knows that Jinx is back, and that I know her."

"Are you going to tell her about what happened with you and Raven?"

A pained look crossed the speedster's face. "I dunno…"

Dick finished his coffee and set the mug down on the counter. "Look, Wally. It _did _happen. There's no use pretending like it didn't. She's your friend, and she deserves to know."

"I… guess."

He still didn't seem convinced. Dick put a reassuring hand on his shoulder. "She's followed you around to four different cities already, and she's been pretty quiet about it. I think that's earned her the right to know a little bit more about you."

The Flash's hesitation was slowly replaced by resolve. He nodded and finished his coffee, and zipped over to Shayera.

"Hey."

She looked up in mild surprise. Wally smiled.

"Kinda zoned out, huh?"

"Yeah."

"She can do that to you," he said, glancing over at the hovering form by the window. He looked back at Shayera. "Come on. I want to show you something."

Zipping to the doors, he turned at the slightly surprised Shayera. He gestured for her to follow with a wave of his arm. "C'mon."

Feeling a little bit reluctant (she had seen John fall for this trick too many times to count), she pushed herself up from the table and followed.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The door read _'Kid Flash the First'._ Shayera smiled and looked over at her speedster friend.

"They had to change it when Bart moved in," he said, shrugging as he smiled. "Maybe they should just change it to _the _Flash, huh?" He pushed a few buttons on the outside of the door, and it slid open obligingly.

"Welcome to my old abode," he said, holding out his arm in a grand gesture. Shayera was taken aback. The room was fairly plain, but what surprised her most of all was that it was neat. She looked back at Flash.

"I suppose someone else came in and tidied the place when you left?"

"Nope. All me."

She thinned her eyes disbelievingly, and Wally shrugged. She carefully walked around the room, as though afraid that something would break if she went too quickly. As she reached the dresser, she stopped. On the wall above the dresser was a message board cluttered with photos. There were so many, she didn't know where to begin.

There was one of Kid Flash and Cyborg laughing at a scowling Beast Boy, who in turn was covered in some kind of yellow slime. Wally saw which picture she was looking at and chuckled.

"Cyborg and Beast Boy. Man, did those guys get up to a lot. They still do, come to think of it."

There was another photo of Wally in his Kid Flash guise, his costume torn and bloody. He had his arms around two others. The one on the left, Shayera recognised as Robin, who was also suitably tattered and bruised.

"Dick?" she asked, and Wally nodded.

She continued her examination of the picture. The other one was dressed similarly to Robin, but had short cut flaming hair. His costume was tattered as well.

And they were all smiling and laughing like they had just had the best time of their lives.

"That's Speedy. Well, he's called Arsenal now. He used to be Green Arrow's sidekick, believe it or not."

"You're kidding. Green Arrow had a sidekick?"

Wally nodded. "Still does. He's got a new Speedy. Angry gal, I gotta say."

"Working with Green Arrow, I can understand why."

Flash laughed, and Shayera looked back to the board of the photos. In fact, the majority of them were of Kid Flash, Robin and Speedy getting up to some kind of mischief.

"They used to call us the Terrible Trio," Wally said, the smile on his face showing the memories that were flooding back to him. "They were really good times."

Shayera frowned. "Why aren't there any pictures of Raven here?"

Wally said nothing. He merely walked over to the dresser and opened the bottom drawer. A small wooden box was the only object in there. He delicately lifted it out and stood, closing the door with his foot as he walked over to the bed. The box creaked slightly as Wally slowly opened it, sitting down on the bed as he did so. Shayera took a seat next to him, and the Fastest Man Alive moved the slowest that Shayera had ever seen him move as he pulled the photos out one by one.

But there weren't just photos in the box. There were scraps of paper, cinema tickets, and a lonesome comic book embedded at the bottom of the possessions. Flash smiled.

"I don't think even Raven knows I've kept this stuff," he said, his voice barely past a whisper. Shayera wasn't sure at this point whether he was talking to her or himself. She looked over the photos as Wally handed them to her. The way he was looking at them it seemed like he hadn't seen them in a long time either. Most of them involved Wally smiling and Raven scowling.

As the photos progressed, Raven seemed to relax more and more.

"This one's my favourite," Wally said, handing her one black and white photo. "It was during Starfire's artistic phase."

The two were sat on a park bench, neither dressed in their costume. They both looked so… comfortable. Wally had his left arm resting on the back of the bench, while his other arm was tucked down by his side, his hand entwined with Raven's. Her other hand was rested comfortably on her lap. She even had a smile on her face.

Wally swallowed loudly. "When the Titans expanded," Flash began, his voice croaking slightly, "I brought Jinx with me. I'd met her before, and I'd seen something. She didn't belong with… people like them. She was something different." He sighed heavily, and Shayera put a hand on his shoulder, squeezing it reassuringly. He looked up at her and smiled sadly.

"But… the weeks went by, and she couldn't stick with it. She didn't want to go back to crime, but… she couldn't keep it up. She didn't want to be a Titan. We argued, and she left. I uh… I never saw her again. I was really broken up. Me being the stupid kid I was, I though it would go on forever, y'know?"

Shayera offered a small smile.

Wally sighed and continued. "Raven… she…" He looked down at the photo he held in his hand of him and Raven. He gently stroked Raven's image with his thumb. "She helped me get through it. I even learned to meditate a bit," he said, a hint of the Flash grin crossing his face.

"And then…" he said, letting out another heavy sigh. "…you know those stories you hear about patients falling in love with their doctors?" He smiled for an instant, but then it was gone, replaced by something that was a mixture of happiness and sadness.

"She was just so… serene, you know? Everyone I'd known up to that point… they'd all been so… busy up here," he said, pointing to his head. "They just didn't stop. But Raven…" he smiled and shook his head.

Shayera just nodded.

"It all seemed to be going so great… and then I did something stupid. _Really _stupid." He smiled, though there was more bitterness in the smile than fondness. "We were too young to even _think _about that taking it that far, but we went ahead and did it anyway. After that… it wasn't the same. God, we were both just _kids_, and… _I _was just a kid… and I couldn't deal with it…"

He frowned. "…So I ran away, back to Central City." He shook his head in disgust. "I couldn't bring myself to go back. I just… couldn't. I didn't even _want_ to think about what the other guys thought of me. So I just buried myself in Kid Flash… and women… my uncle made me go to Gotham College, but I was pretty much the same… and then I was _the _Flash, and I just got worse. I was just… killing myself from the inside out."

He looked up to face her. "And that's when I met you guys. You guys turned me around. You were just so perfect, and brave, and… you expected so much of me, y'know? So I straightened out. _That's _why I didn't want you to know about all of this. I was just beginning to feel good about myself, to make a difference again. I felt like a real hero for a change. And if I told you, I…"

"You were afraid that we'd see you as less of a hero."

Wally nodded silently. "And I know it was selfish and wrong of me to do that, but… I hadn't felt good… _really _good… since…"

"Raven."

He nodded again, and then took a deep breath. He blew it out and smiled. "Whew. Sorry about that. Got a little teary eyed there."

He collected all the photos together quickly, putting them back into the box as delicately as he could.

"Wally."

He went over to the drawer and put the box back in.

"Wally."

As he went to the door he turned to face her. "We should we really be going-"

"Wally."

"-I mean, Raven's probably finished by-"

"Wally."

He stopped talking and sighed, his breathing shaky. Shayera stepped forward and embraced her friend as he had done so many times for her. She felt him relax into the embrace, wrapping his arms around her and resting his head on her shoulder.

"I'm sorry," he whispered from her shoulder. "I should have told you. You deserved to-"

"I understand, Wally." She pulled herself away from him, and looked up at her friend. "I really do."

The scarlet speedster smiled fondly. "Thanks." He pointed to the ceiling. "I, uh… really think we should be heading back up now. Raven's probably finished."

She nodded, and, after locking the door behind them, headed up to the common room area side by side.

"What did Dick think?"

"Hmm?"

"Dick. You told me before that you went to college with him. Was he…?"

"Ticked off? No. He was having women issues, too, so he couldn't really comment."

"Really? What kind of-"

"Okay, now _that's _none of your business," Wally said jokingly, putting up a hand to halt her enquiry. "Geez, you're worse than my mom…"

"Oooh… Below the belt."

The two laughed and joked all the way up to the common room.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dick turned as the doors opened and saw Wally and Shayera emerge, laughing as they did so. Nightwing smiled. It was always nice to be the instigator of this kind of thing. Wally saw Raven and frowned in puzzlement. He walked over to Dick.

"She's not done yet?"

Dick shook his head. "She couldn't find anything at the observatory, so I told her to look for Jinx."

The scarlet speedster opened his mouth, and then closed it. "Okay."

Nightwing looked over at Shayera. "He told you?"

She nodded, then smiled. "You had trouble with women too, from what I hear."

It was like a scowl chain. Nightwing scowled at Flash, and Flash scowled at Shayera. Wally quickly realised that Dick was giving him the death glare, and quickly started to back away.

"Now… I didn't tell her anything… I just said that y-"

He was interrupted by a pained groan from Raven. She was being thrown back and forth by some unseen force. Flash was by her side in an instant, and grabbed her as she fell backwards to the floor

"What happened?" Dick asked as he ran over.

Raven groaned again. "Something… blocked me. Violently. But I did find Jinx. Or at least some trace of her."

"Can you show us where?" Shayera asked, and Raven nodded. Dick went over to the main computer at the front of the common room, and punched up a globe map. Wally delicately assisted Raven over to the monitor. Closing her eyes, she gestured to a point on the map.

"There."

Dick magnified the area.

"Fawcett City."

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

(A/N: Damn… this felt like a whopper to write. Maybe it's all the dialogue, or the emotional stuff… I dunno.

I'm missing _Teen Titans _already.

Anyway, review.)


	6. Face to Face

Disclaimer: I don't own _Justice League Unlimited _or _Teen Titans_. Hoorah!

_**Connections**_

**_Chapter Six: Face to Face_**

Dick raised an eyebrow beneath his thin mask before looking over at Wally. He lowered his voice. "Do you _always_ let Shayera do the flying?"

The speedster whipped his head around to face him. "Would _you_ wantto argue with her?"

Nightwing smiled and nodded before leaning back in his chair again. He had never been to Fawcett City before. He wondered what it was like as he looked out the window, the clouds beneath them as they flew to their destination.

"Hey, Dick?"

He turned to look at his speedster friend. "Hmm?"

"Thanks for making me talk to Shayera."

He waved a dismissive hand. "It's nothing." He looked to the front of the Javelin, and briefly wondered why Wally had elected to sit at the very back of the jet. He nodded at the dark empath that was sat next to Shayera in the front.

"Have you talked to Raven yet?"

Flash sighed. "Not yet. But I will."

Dick shot him a 'yeah right' look, prompting the Fastest Man Alive to put up his hands defensively.

"I will, I swear! It's just that now isn't exactly the best time. We've got a mission, dude."

The black haired crime fighter was about to object, but then thought better of it. Wally _was _right, whether Dick liked it or not. Wally shook his head and smiled.

"Anyway, that's not important right now. We didn't really get a chance to talk before, so… how've you been?"

"Pretty good, for the most part," Dick replied, shrugging. "Blockbuster's losing his grip on Bludhaven piece by piece-"

"Thanks to you," Wally cut in, winking.

Nightwing tilted his head to the side slightly. "Well, not really. The police really seem to be getting their act together, too. But Blockbuster's not done."

The scarlet speedster nodded sombrely, though Dick doubted he was taking anything he said seriously. Wally's head whipped back up to look at him.

"How about Kori? Things going okay with her?"

He smiled at the mention of the Tamaranian.

"We're doing pretty good," he said, before quickly cutting himself off. Wally thinned his eyes.

"…_How_ good?"

Dick remained silent.

Wally's eyes widened, the lenses in his mask nearly popping off. "Holy- _that_ good?"

Dick remained silent.

"Wow… I wasn't expecting that." Nightwing shot him a look. "Well, I _was_, but I wasn't, uh… that is, I, uh… never mind."

The ex Boy Wonder sighed. "Well, I'm not exactly sure yet, so just… keep it under your hat, all right?"

Flash offered a mock salute and a wink. "Aye aye." He turned back to the window briefly before his head whipped around once more to question Nightwing.

"Hey… have you heard from Donna recently?"

"Why? Hoping to meet all your ex girlfriends in one day?"

A scowl crossed the speedster's face. "Oh, ha ha. That's funny. I was just curious." Dick thought that he had left it at that. Wally quickly spoke again. "Besides, it's not like she was _actually_ my girlfriend or anything."

"Is that because she dumped you for Roy, or something else I'm missing?" Dick replied slowly, a smirk on his face.

"Hey, you know what? Forget it; I don't have to take this," he said, crossing his arms in a mock huff before turning to the window.

The once leader of the Teen Titans smiled and looked out the window. As much as he enjoyed the solo hero job, he _had _missed being part of a team. He knew that the Titans would welcome him back with open arms, but he felt like he didn't belong there. The four Titans he had led as a teenager had worked too long and too hard for him to suddenly show up and take over. Then another thought occurred to him. Maybe he could make his own team? People who were outsiders, just like he was.

He shook his head, banishing the thought from his head. He turned back to Wally, determined to annoy the speedster even more.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The two women stared forward in silence as they flew down through the clouds. Raven could see the water tower of Fawcett City as they approached the sprawling landscape. At least, she expected it to be a sprawling landscape. A deep purple eyebrow rose.

_How could this be called a city?_

Shayera frowned. "How could this be called a city?" she asked aloud, though more to herself than anyone else.

"Ego, I suppose," Raven offered, and Shayera nodded in agreement. The empath kept her gaze forward as she spoke. "So how much did Wally tell you?"

The Thanagarian woman kept her eyes forward also. "Enough to understand why he's acting the way he is." She paused for a moment, glancing over her shoulder to look at the speedster out of the corner of her eye. "He blames himself, you know."

Raven paused, not knowing how to respond. "He does?"

Shayera nodded silently. "For everything."

"Look, it's not like he's totally blameless," her tone becoming defensive.

"No. But then again, neither are you." She took her eyes off the viewport in front of her to look at her. Her expression was one of concern. "I just think you should talk to him. He's really trying to make it up to you, in his own weird, Flash way."

The empath was smiled silently as Shayera brought the Javelin in for a landing on the outskirts of the city.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Flash eyed the school building incredulously. "Jinx… was in _here_?"

Her eyes in the usual half closed position, Raven looked over at him. "Yes. I admit, it's strange, but _that's _where she was before whatever it was blocked me."

Shayera walked forward, drawing her mace. "Then let's stop arguing about it and go in." She raised her mace to the double doors, and almost brought it down before Dick slipped in front of her.

"Why don't you let _me_ do this?" he asked, producing lock picks from somewhere on his person. Shrugging, Shayera gestured to the door and stepped back, resting the mace on her shoulder. Flash and Raven stood back from the proceedings.

"You keep interesting company these days," Raven said, nodding her head slightly towards Shayera. He smiled.

"Yeah. She's really great, though."

A deep purple eyebrow shot up. "Are you two…?"

Flash burst out laughing, but then quickly covered his mouth as he realised they were breaking and entering at the dead of night. He took a breath and cleared his throat quietly.

"Uh, no. We're not. I mean, I haven't really, uh… since…" the speedster rubbed the back of his neck, his face going a shade of red that would match his costume.

Before the empath could comment, Dick had opened the double doors. He cautiously walked forward, putting his lock picks back into their hiding place somewhere on his sleeve. He entered the building, disappearing into darkness for a few seconds before reappearing.

"All clear."

The three entered, and Raven closed the doors behind them telekinetically. Reaching out with her powers, she found the light switches. The room was suddenly bathed in light, and everyone winced to block out the sudden influx of brightness. They were in the gym hall. Having checked the corridors, Dick turned to Raven.

"Okay, Raven. Have a look."

She was about to comply when they were suddenly plunged into darkness once again. Sighing, the dark empath reached out with her telekinesis to the light switches, and flicked them upwards.

Nothing happened.

She flicked the switches a few more times.

They were still surrounded by the blanketing darkness.

"Raven?" Dick called out.

"The switches aren't working. I think-" she stopped as she sensed something.

There was someone else in the room with them. Someone very familiar.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Grodd's sources had been surprisingly accurate. Slade briefly felt disappointed in himself for having not taken the super intelligent gorilla up on his offer to join his organisation. Briefly. He could never permanently allow himself to take orders from another. It just felt wrong. Like it was a crime against nature; or at least, a crime against _his _nature. He looked down at the four heroes gathered before him through his infra red lens.

He had never fought members of the Justice League before. He wondered how much of a challenge they would pose. He had followed them all the way to Fawcett City before easily catching up on their trail himself. He was surprised that Nightwing hadn't caught on. But then again, the mercenary doubted that the crime fighter had fought anyone quite like him in some time. He wondered what his reaction would be. A female voice interrupted his thoughts. It was the Thanagarian.

"Hang on. I'll give us some light." With a twist of her mace, energy crackled and popped around the spiky ball. Slade sighed.

_Well, no time like the present._

He leapt forward and grabbed the hilt of the mace with his left hand, using his right hand to jab his fingers painfully into her wrist. She yelled in pain and let go of the mace while Slade pulled on the weapon, easily snapping the leather strap attached to the bottom of the hilt. He struck out with his right hand, sending her flying across the room and headfirst into a brick wall.

Wasting no time, he swung the mace again, catching the Flash in the chest with the weapon, and sending him sprawling across the large hall.

Yet another swing, this time to his right, and Nightwing received a blow to the chin from the spiked weapon, slamming him into the wall behind him.

_Only one left._

He quickly turned to attack Raven before the mace was blasted from his grip by black energy. Another bolt hit his chest and sent him sliding across the ground. He looked up to see two white eyes glowing in the darkness.

"I don't need my eyes to see in the dark," she said, advancing on him. Slade thinned his eye, reaching into his utility belt and pulling out a small black box.

"Neither do I."

He threw the box at her, which attached itself to her stomach. Metal tentacles wrapped their way around the dark empath, sending several jolts of electricity through her before she fell to the ground. Slade seriously doubted that she was dead, but she was out of the picture for now.

He pushed himself to his feet with a grunt and surveyed the situation with his infrared lens covered eye. Before he could do much else, a red blur slammed into him, hurling him through the double doors and out into the car park of the school, and back into the side of a car. Metal warped and glass shattered as he collided with the automobile. Looking up, he saw the Flash standing before him on the other side of the car park, grasping his chest as he struggled to breathe.

Slade guessed that he had broken some of the speedster's ribs with the mace. Nonchalantly wiping the shards of glass from his shoulders, Slade stood, cricking his neck as he did so. The speedster's eyes thinned.

"Who are you?"

Chuckling, Slade raised a hand, and beckoned the Flash forward. "Does it really matter?"

He shrugged, grimacing at the pain in his chest. "Not really," he said, charging forward. He threw his fist forward at the mercenary, but only hit air as Slade jumped off to Flash's left, easily dodging the blow. Slade now had his back to a wall. The Fastest Man Alive smirked and charged forward again, his fist drawn. Slade simply stood as he charged forward, only ducking beneath the blow at the last second.

Bones cracked and muscle tore as the Flash's hand collided with the brick wall, breaking it instantly. He screamed in pain as he fell to one knee, cradling his wrist. A smirk broke out on Slade's face. He brought his knee forward, sending it with deadly force into the speedster's jaw. The Fastest Man Alive's head snapped back, and he fell onto his back, groaning in pain. He tried to roll over and get away.

Slade knelt on the speedster, resting his knee on the hero's chest. With a flick of his wrist, a small blade appeared in Slade's hand. Another flick, and the blade was pointing downwards. He brought the blade down swiftly and efficiently. Before the blade could even get close to Flash's face, however, Slade heard an incensed battle cry, and looked up in time to be on the receiving end of Shayera's mace.

The mercenary was flung back onto the hood of another parked car, denting the smooth metal upon impact. He tried to get up, but found himself pinned to the car by black energy. A quick glance to his right, and he saw two cars being surrounded in dark energy and flung into the air. He sighed as he saw the cars toppling down towards him.

_Next time, just kill them._

With a deafening crash, the cars landed. Raven looked over as Nightwing pulled four throwing stars from his utility belt, two in each hand. He flung them towards the two cars, two to nip the fuel lines of the cars, and the other two to create a spark. The pile of metal and rubber exploded magnificently, sending a plume of dark smoke into the air that could no doubt be seen for some distance.

Shayera knelt over the injured Wally, and was shocked by how quickly he got up. Wally hissed through his teeth as he rubbed his hand. It seemed to be clenched in a strange position.

Dick, a stony expression on his face, kept his eyes on the fire in front of them.

"Raven. Get us out of here. Quickly."

She didn't need telling twice. The group were encompassed in dark energy and whisked away to the Javelin's location. As they disappeared, something within the flaming wreck stirred. Slade pulled himself from the wreckage, groaning as he straightened his back. He hated burns. They took the longest time to heal.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Wally? Are you okay?"

He nodded and clenched his teeth, still holding on to his right hand. An eyebrow rose on the Thanagarian's face.

"What's wrong with your hand?"

"I broke it in the fight," Flash replied, still hissing through his teeth. "It healed all wrong." He offered a small smile, though it was extremely pained. "One of the perks of an accelerated metabolism, I guess."

"But-"

"Hey, Raven!" Wally shouted out, completely ignoring Shayera for the moment. "Could I get a hand here?" He looked over at Shayera, winking. "Don't worry 'bout it."

Shayera looked over as Raven arrived. Quickly surmising the situation, Raven raised a purple eyebrow. "Broken hand?"

Flash nodded, and Raven responded with a slow nod of her own.

"All right. Whenever you're ready."

Wally stood and walked over to a nearby wall. He took several deep breaths and drew back his fist.

Shayera cocked an eyebrow. "What are you-?"

Wally slammed his hand into the brick wall, breaking it instantly. He yelled in pain, and Shayera shot over to him.

"What do you think you're-!"

Without a word, Raven surrounded his broken hand with a cast made from black energy. Wally smiled and looked over at Shayera.

"It helps the bones to knit together in the right position," he said, letting out a sigh of relief as the pain began to subside. After about a minute, Wally gave Raven a thumbs up, and the black energy disappeared. Appearing satisfied, Flash clenched his now perfectly healed hand, punching the air with it as thought to test it. He winced as he stretched. "My ribs are still messed up…" he said, though more to himself than anyone else.

Shayera was horrified. "How many times have you had to that?"

"Uh… ever since I was Kid Flash, I think."

"So you were doing this while you were in the League?"

He nodded, and laughed slightly. "Yeah, and I tell you, it was hard without Raven. I had to do it about five times after every fight until J'onn and GL caught me. J'onn made a machine that set it for me."

"Every fight?"

"Well, not _every _fight, but yeah, sometimes I would punch or kick something that was too hard."

"Wally, I-" Shayera stopped mid-sentence to rub her forehead. "I had no idea."

The scarlet speedster shrugged, an easy smile on his face. "Eh, no big deal."

"_No big deal_? Wally, you were breaking your hand after every fight, and I had no idea! I feel so…"

"Gosh darned ignorant?" he said, adopting his best Vigilante voice.

"Don't you dare make light of this, Wally West. I'm your friend. You do anything else like this without telling me, and there will be hell to pay. You understand?"

"Yes, ma'am," he replied sheepishly, his hands behind his back. The Thanagarian's face softened, and she shook her head.

"At least you're okay."

Flash shook his head. "Yeah, well, I almost wasn't. That guy was tough."

"You don't know who he is?"

Wally shook his head. Raven's voice interrupted their conversation.

"His name is Slade Wilson. He's also known as the mercenary Deathstroke."

"How do you know him?" the speedster asked, and Raven's expression darkened.

"He was an enemy of the Titans. He was one of the worst."

"How come I never heard about him?"

"It was before your time."

Shayera put a hand on her hip. "So why's he here?"

Raven was about to respond when Dick interrupted her.

"To throw us off. We were getting close. And whoever sent him knows about our past with him."

Flash cocked an eyebrow. "What makes you say that?"

Nightwing was silent for the longest time before he responded, walking towards the Javelin.

"Because that can't be Slade. I killed him."

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Shayera tried to overhear the conversation going on between the three Titans in the back but came up short. She decided to simply concentrate on the flight back to the Metro Tower. Wally would tell her eventually. If not, she was sure that Batman would know about it. Ironically enough, most of the time she found Batman easier to crack than the Flash. As she pondered this seemingly impossible paradox, Wally, Dick and Raven discussed what had happened those many years ago.

Nightwing, his arms crossed, let out a long breath through his nose. "…we followed him into the factory, and I got separated from the rest of you."

Raven nodded. "I remember. Slade's robots were everywhere. Cyborg was the first one to reach you." Her eyes reflected the mystery surrounding the situation. "He wouldn't tell us what he saw. And neither would you."

"It was an accident," the ex-Boy Wonder said, looking out the window. "We were fighting on the walkway… he threw some explosives at me, and the whole thing toppled. I managed to fire off a grappling hook in time, but he…" He rested his head back on the cushion, closing his eyes beneath his thin mask. "I could've tried to save him. I _should've_ tried to save him."

Wally put a hand on his shoulder. "But hey, he's alive, right? So that means-"

"It's not him."

Raven spoke up next. "I reached out with my abilities, Dick. It's him. I'll never forget what he felt like… up here," she said, tapping the side of her head.

"Then he's somehow emitting false brain waves."

Wally sighed. "Dick-"

"IT'S NOT HIM!"

Shayera looked around to see what was going on. Dick lowered his voice.

"You don't get it, do you? I saw him fall into that vat. I watched as he melted away. Flesh, bone, everything. I watched as he screamed in pain, until there was nothing left of him but a bad memory. He's dead. So drop it."

The flight back to the Metro Tower was silent.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

John Stewart looked at his coffee cautiously. He hated scalding hot coffee. There should be a setting on the machine to give warm coffee. That was fine. Why would anyone want their mouth burned away? He groaned and rubbed the back of his sore neck. Just as he was about to take a sip, his communicator beeped in his ear.

"Green Lantern," he said, putting his fingers to the earpiece.

Mr Terrific's voice came through the speaker. _"Do you remember that theft that you and Supergirl tended to in Coast City?"_

The Green Lantern of Sector 2814 nodded. "There was a hole ripped in the wall. We couldn't find anything further, so we called it a day. Why?"

"_You might want to come up here."_

John shrugged and sipped at his coffee. He grimaced as it burnt his tongue. Grumbling some alien curse from a far away planet, he dumped the coffee in the trash and headed to the main control center of the Watchtower. Once there, he walked over to Mr Terrific.

"What's the problem?"

After a cursory glance over his shoulder, Mr Terrific slid on his chair around the control panel. Reaching the terminal he wanted, he began punching in details.

"We just got a call from a secret research test base. Usually they wouldn't come to us with this kind of problem, but they decided to make an exception in this case. Seeing as it was something the League's dealt with before." A picture of a high security military installation appeared on the screen. "Look familiar?"

John leant forward and thinned his emerald eyes, then shook his head. "Should I?"

"It's the same base that the nuclear fusion device was stolen from all those months ago. I seem to remember that the League managed to reverse the effect it had on the sun. But this time, the plans have been stolen. The equipment needed to create the device was stolen from the Wayne Tech facility in Coast."

The Green Lantern's eyes widened. The nuclear fusion device… it was something he had almost forgotten about. The strange spirits that had possessed the League wanted to fire it into the sun and snuff it out, encapsulating the entire planet in darkness. John didn't know the specifics, but Wally had told him something about lizard men… or was it lizard people…?

John shook his head from his musings. He looked over at Mr Terrific. "So someone wants to knock out the sun. Do we have any leads?"

The red eyed administrator sighed. "You're not going to like it, but…" he punched up another image, producing a picture of a wall with a rather large hole in it. "Same kind of hole, am I right?"

John nodded silently.

"The cameras picked up something else, though," he said, his hand working over the keyboard with expert precision. The image on the monitor changed yet again, this time yielding the image of someone ripping the hole in said wall. Someone the League knew very well.

John leant forward, confusion knotting his brow. "What in…?" He looked over at Mr Terrific. "What does _he _want with plans for a nuclear fusion device?"

Mr Terrific shrugged. John pushed himself away from the monitors. "I'm heading over there to check the place over. If anything else comes up, call me."

"Will do."

John turned and walked out the hallway. The Green Lantern of Sector 2814 was not easily confused. He absolutely detested the feeling. It made him feel out of control, helpless. And this situation was doing much of the same thing. Because as much as he disliked the guy, John _knew _he wasn't capable of what the footage showed.

The Earth's Mightiest Mortal, otherwise known as Captain Marvel, would _not _break into a high security military facility.

Would he?

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

(A/N: The plot thickens…

Anyway, reviews good, so gimme.)


	7. Time to Breathe

Disclaimer: I don't own _Justice League Unlimited _or _Teen Titans._

_**Connections**_

_**Chapter Seven: Time to Breathe**_

The flight back to the Metro Tower was a quiet one. Dick had asked to be alone, so Raven and Wally had moved closer to the front of the jet, but not so close that Shayera could hear them. Much to the flame haired Thanagarian's annoyance.

The Scarlet Speedster glanced over at the dark empath nervously, trying to keep his eyes forward the entire time. Eventually, he just gave up and turned to face her.

"So do you think it's really that Slade guy?"

Raven looked quite surprised by Wally's sudden question. "I suppose it's possible. He's proven impervious to death before."

"Yeah… I know how that can be."

A wry smile crossed Raven's face. "What? The 'being impervious to death' thing?"

"Hey, you'd be surprised," he responded, a slight smirk on his face.

There was a silence for a few moments. The smile faded from Raven's face.

"I felt you go, you know," she said, her voice barely above a whisper.

"What?" Wally asked, frowning slightly, though it was more from not understanding her words than not hearing them.

"I felt it… when you disappeared into that… that other plane."

Flash's brow loosened in comprehension. "You mean when I went into the Speed Force…"

She nodded, a look of indescribable pain on her face as she closed her eyes. "I thought you were dead. I wanted to go out and find you, to know what happened to you. And then you came back… but I still wanted to find you… To make sure you were all right."

"…Raven…" Wally wanted to reach out and touch her; to hold her. To do something other than just say her name.

She smiled. "You always called me Raven. You never used any nicknames like the others did. Like you did for all the others."

"Well… it was your name. I only used the nicknames for their superhero identities. But Raven wasn't your disguise… it was you."

She opened her eyes and looked into his. "Whatever the reason… thank you."

It was times like this that Wally was glad his suit was red; when he blushed furiously, it didn't seem to register that much. Back when he was Kid Flash, the yellow of his suit would turn a slight orange. Or at least, it seemed that way to his young, self conscious mind.

Shayera brought the Javelin in for a landing, chancing a glance over her shoulder to see Wally and Raven talking quietly. A small smile spread across her face as the Javelin touched down and the engines deactivated themselves.

As the group of four stepped down off the ramp, Wally spotted Stargirl and S.T.R.I.P.E waiting for them.

"_You have fun?"_ the hulking white robot asked. Flash could all but see the wry smile on his face.

"All yours. Just don't sit in the third chair on left," he said, waving a hand in front of his nose. Shayera shook her head, and Raven's face communicated the same message.

Stargirl hid her smile, but then spotted Nightwing stood at the back, his arms crossed and head down in deep thought.

"Hi. I don't think we've met," she said, extending her hand. Dick didn't reply. "Um… hello?"

The ex-Boy Wonder looked up in mild surprise, then smiled slightly. "Oh, sorry. I'm Nightwing," he said, shaking her hand politely. Wally could see that he really didn't want this conversation to continue for too long.

"Oh, okay. Supergirl's mentioned you now and then." She smiled, and then paused. "Are you a member of the League? I don't remember seeing you around."

Raven leaned over towards Wally. "Please tell me I wasn't that obvious when I liked you."

Flash chuckled at the joke, prompting the others to look over at him. He raised his hands in mock surrender. "Sorry. Carry on, carry on." He looked over at Raven, an easy smile still on his lips.

"That was so not cool."

Raven's face returned the smile. "Never have been, never will be."

The Fastest Man Alive nodded his head to the exit of the landing bay. "C'mon. I'll show you around." He turned to look at Nightwing, who was still trying to remove himself from Stargirl's adoring attentions.

"Nightwing, you coming?"

"Please," he said instantaneously, quickly giving a wave to Stargirl and following the other two out.

Shayera stood motionless for a moment, simply standing in front of Stargirl and S.T.R.I.P.E. After offering a faint smile and a shrug, she left the landing bay as well.

"_Courtney! Get your butt back here! You're not certified to fly those things yet! Courtney!"_

The winged heroine couldn't help but smile.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

John Stewart crouched on the rocky cliff, using his ring to make his costume blend in with the brownish grey environment. After talking to the military personnel at the base, he had discovered that 'Captain Marvel' (if it really was him) had only managed to find half of the plans required to build the nuclear fusion device. If he wanted to build the whole thing, he would have to come back.

He had toyed with the idea of calling for backup, but then remembered that Captain Marvel still had a Justice League issue communicator in case of emergencies. It was conceivable that he was listening into their transmissions, so John decided to remain quiet and wait for him to come back.

Despite his tough military training with both the Marines and the Green Lantern Corp, John found himself nodding off as he waited for Captain Marvel to return. He was suddenly knocked from his drowsy state by an explosion from the base. He jumped to his feet and assessed the situation.

Whoever it was, it sure looked like Captain Marvel. He was throwing the tanks around as though they were toys. After disposing of the heavy artillery, he made quick work of the troops, whether they used RPG's or semi automatic weapons. Green Lantern activated his ring and jumped into action.

He quickly created a green bubble around 'Marvel', who looked around in alarm at his sudden captivity. When he saw John, he smirked.

"I remember you, human."

An eyebrow rose on the Green Lantern's face. The smirk intensified.

"You couldn't stop me then, and you can't stop me now," 'Marvel' continued, before knotting his fists together and slamming them down into the bubble.

John grunted from the strain of trying to maintain the bubble under such pressure. 'Captain Marvel' managed to create a thin crack in the green energy sphere, and pushed his fingers through. He began to pull the crack in opposite directions, attempting to open the bubble by force.

John tried his utmost to maintain the bubble, but 'Marvel's strength was too much. He yelled in pain as the bubble was ripped apart. He looked up in time to see Marvel charging towards him at superspeed. His fist collided with John's chin, sending him toppling backwards into the cliff face. Upon impact, John created an indentation in the rocky wall. Grunting, he pulled himself out, only to be greeted by the sight of 'Marvel' charging towards him yet again.

He didn't even have enough time to erect his force field before his opponent slammed into him full force, collapsing the cliff face onto him.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Flash tried to concentrate on what Mr Terrific was saying on the monitor, but constantly found his eyes wandering to the dark empath that was currently sat patiently at a table talking to Dick.

"_Flash? Are you listening?"_

"Uh, yeah. Sorry. Shayera's gonna be along in a minute."

"_What did you find in Fawcett City?"_

The Scarlet Speedster shrugged. "Zip, except for a hitman called Slade coming after us."

An eyebrow cocked on the Watchtower administrator's face. _"Slade? As in Slade Wilson?"_

"You know him?"

"_Only by reputation. He's called Deathstroke in most circles. Only works for the best, and even then, only when the targets are a challenge. Somebody must really hate you."_

Flash nodded with a sigh. "You want a list?"

A smile tugged on Mr Terrific's lips. _"Did you happen to run into Captain Marvel?"_

"No, it was weird. I thought we'd run into him for sure, especially since we were going to the school."

"_Why would going to the school make a difference?"_

Wally's eyes widened beneath his mask. He remembered how Superman had told the original seven about Marvel's abilities and secret identity (though he didn't know the kid's name). He _also _remembered how they were sworn to secrecy on the subject.

"Uh… never mind." He cocked an eyebrow. "Any reason you asked?"

Mr Terrific was silent for a moment. _"I'm guessing since you were the most prominent name on the case file, you should know. The plans for a Nuclear Fusion Device were stolen from a secret military base."_

Wally's face remained blank.

"_You may remember an entity that possessed the League and attempted to throw the device into the sun and blot it out."_

"The snake men?"

Mr Terrific nodded. _"Right. Well, someone has stolen the plans for it, and also taken the parts needed to make such a device from a Wayne Tech facility in Coast City. Both places had a hole torn in the wall; almost like an accidental calling card."_

"Okay, I'm with you so far."

"_Captain Marvel was seen taking the plans for the Nuclear Fusion Device."_

"No way…" Something clicked in Flash's mind. "Hey, have you got a picture of those two holes?"

Mr Terrific nodded. _"Let me just punch them up for you."_

The two images appeared on the screen instantly. Wally's eyes widened beneath his mask. It looked like the exact same hole that was left in Tetch's lab.

"_Flash?"_

He shook his head. "Uh, yeah?"

"_Something wrong?"_

"I think this might have something to do with our case."

"_How do you figure?"_

"There was a hole just like this one in the Mad Hatter's lab. All of his mind control equipment had been stolen."

"_Not exactly concrete evidence, Flash. It doesn't prove that they're linked."_

"I know, I know… but you've got to admit, it's one hell of a coincidence if they're not." Mr Terrific nodded his head thoughtfully.

"_Where are you off to now?"_

Flash shrugged and let out a sigh of frustration. "No idea. The trail's run dry."

"_Well, I'll keep my eyes and ears open for anything."_

"Thanks, Mr T." He looked over and saw Shayera approaching. "Ah; here's Shayera for you." As he passed by Shayera he gave her a high five, as though tagging her in to a wrestling match. He winked at her, a grin on his face. "Have fun."

"You too," she replied slyly, returning his wink. Wally frowned slightly, though the smile remained on his face.

_What's that supposed to mean?_

As he approached the table where Raven was sat, he realised that she was nowhere to be found. Nightwing sipped on his mug of coffee, and stared into the brown liquid once he had set it down on the table.

"Where's Raven?" Wally asked, pulling up a chair and sitting down next to his friend.

Dick nodded over in the direction of a nearby computer terminal. Wally followed his nod and saw Raven talking to someone on the screen.

"She's making a call to Cyborg; telling him why she left the Tower unguarded."

Wally smiled. "He wasn't too pleased, huh?"

Dick shrugged nonchalantly. "He'll let it go; he always does. You remember how many times he would yell at you, me and Roy?"

"Yeah," Wally laughed.

"And _I _was the leader. I tell you, you two made me less respectable."

"Hey, it's not our fault you had a zest for random acts of destruction."

Nightwing laughed. "You remember that time when we were fighting the Hive Five in that theatre?"

"I remember that gooey stuff going _everywhere._ And then Cyborg saying-"

"-'No more pie!'" the two said simultaneously, their sudden burst of laughter causing Shayera and the rest of the staff to look up at them. The two gradually calmed down, and Wally wiped a tear from his eye.

"Man… now _that_ was a good day."

"Yeah… say, what's Roy up to these days? I haven't heard much from him recently."

"Uh, let's see… he's a reserve League member like you and the other guys… Oh, and he likes to be called Arsenal now. But we still call him Speedy to tick him off. Especially Ollie," Flash added, a cheeky grin on his face.

"Wait… doesn't Ollie have another Speedy? A Speedy that's a girl?"

"Yep," Wally replied instantly, the smile on his face growing. Dick paused for a moment, then smirked.

"I doubt Roy likes being compared to a girl."

"Why not? We did it enough back in the day. I mean, how much can you play with your hair?"

Raven's voice interrupted the proceedings. "I seem to remember that you two did it enough." She turned to Wally. "_You _even made your own formula."

"Oh, _did _he?" Shayera's voice added with a very amused tone. She leaned forward resting her elbow on the thoroughly embarrassed speedster's shoulder. "Care to give me a few tips?"

"Hey, it's not like _he _didn't do anything with his hair either," he said defensively, pointing at Dick. "Some days, his hair would be so shiny, you'd be able to see it from-" Wally stopped suddenly. "…a satellite."

Shayera cocked an eyebrow. "Wally?"

"Just a sec." He shot away and over to the computer terminal where Shayera had been making his report to Mr Terrific. The others soon joined him. Mr Terrific's face appeared on the monitor.

"_Watchtower."_

"Yeah, Mr T. A quick question for you. When Captain Marvel left, did he still have his communicator earpiece thing?"

"_Yeah. He was put on reserve League member status, so it's rarely on."_

"But you could still track it though, right?"

He scratched his chin thoughtfully. _"I suppose… but only where he's been frequently. The latent signal isn't strong enough to last for too long, and even then… it'll be hard to get an exact lock."_

A grin spread across the speedster's face. "Great! Could you do it?"

"_Already on it."_

Flash sat in a nearby chair and leant back, propping his head on his hands as they waited for the results. The other three just stared at him in shock.

"Well… _that_ was new," Raven said quietly. Dick and Shayera just nodded.

"_Flash?"_

He was instantly at the monitor. "Got something?"

"_Well, like I said, it's very hard to track from up here. The signal keeps on fading in and out. But the last I could make out he was in Jump City. Judging by the strength of the signal, he's been going back and forth through there quite a bit, and in the past few weeks, too."_

Flash looked up at Raven, who had an equally surprised look on her face.

"I had no idea. There were no sightings or indications he was there at all."

"And being covert isn't exactly his style," Shayera added.

Nightwing crossed his arms. "All right. Raven and I will check it out."

Flash stood to his full height. "But-"

Dick put a hand up to stop any further objections. "You should stay here in case any other leads come up."

Wally slumped, and Shayera put a supportive hand on his shoulder.

"He's right, Wally."

"Okay, fine," he huffed, and shot a mock glare at Nightwing. "Are you _sure _you're not still the leader?"

Offering only a small smile, Nightwing headed for the teleportation room. Raven hesitated for a moment, then headed off in the same direction, disappearing around the corner as she walked into the corridor. Wally stood, almost frozen in place as he watched them go. Shayera loudly cleared her throat, and Flash looked over at her.

Widening her eyes slightly, Shayera nodded several times in the direction that Raven had left. A grin spread across his face, and he quickly followed. He turned the corner and zoomed down the corridor until he caught up with Raven.

"Wait, Raven!"

She stopped and turned to face him, a slightly surprised look on her face. And something else that Wally couldn't quite make out. Relief?

He came to a halt in front of her. "I… I didn't want you to go without me telling you… how sorry I am."

She sighed and closed her eyes. "You don't have to apologise, Wally. What happened was as much my fault as yours."

"I know, but after that… I'm sorry I ran away like I did. I was young, and stupid… and I know that's no excuse, because you were young too, and-"

Raven put a finger on his lips to silence him. "It's all right, Wally. I know. You… you may not have known this, but… because of what we did, and how close we were… I could feel how afraid you were. I could feel how you hated yourself for what you were doing…"

She took a deep breath, and looked deeply into his eyes.

"That's why I couldn't bring myself to be angry with you… even though the others continually said I had every right to be. Because I knew."

Flash reached up gently stroked Raven's cheek. "I… I wanted to come back so many times… but every time, I just… I couldn't…"

"Wally… I know. You don't need to keep on punishing yourself." She paused, putting a gentle hand on his arm. "You didn't even need to back then."

"Raven! Let's-" Dick stopped mid sentence as he saw Wally and Raven stood in the corridor. He cleared his throat and looked down sheepishly. "Uh… erm… sorry."

Flash smiled. "I see he's got over his awkward stage."

Raven sighed. "Like a bull in a china shop…"

"Raven… I know that… that we could never be like we were… but…"

"Wally…" Raven replied slowly, letting out a heavy sigh as she did so. "…you'll always be an important part of my life, but… we can't… it wouldn't…"

"I know, I know, but... I could at least come over to the Tower and see you, right?"

A gentle smile emerged on the dark empath's face. "I'd like that."

"Great," he replied, the usual Flash grin returning with a vengeance. "Uh… I guess you'd probably get going now."

Raven shook herself from her reverie. "Right. I'll… see you later."

"I'll be here. Probably. Or in Central City. Or at the Watchtower. Or maybe at Earl's Diner; I might get hungry."

Flash's grin grew as Raven let out a small laugh and walked around the corner. He simply stood in the corridor for the next few minutes, grinning like an idiot while the League workers walked by, giving him strange looks as they went.

Before long, Shayera was stood beside him. "So? How'd it go?"

Wally didn't respond. He just turned and walked down the corridor, the grin still firmly plastered on his face.

"That good, huh?" She said quietly, then followed her speedy comrade.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Shayera knew she wasn't a patient woman. Many people had told her so many times. But she _knew _she wasn't this bad. Her eye twitched imperceptibly as Wally's tapping finger increased in speed. She put hand on his.

"Wally!" He looked up in shock. She took a deep breath. "Just… calm down."

"Right, right. I'm just worried. They should have checked in by now. What if they're in trouble?"

"Well, of course, they _are _incredibly weak and helpless, so _obviously_ they won't be able to defend themselves."

He shot her a look. "I'm pretty fast and strong. Does that stop you from worrying about me?"

"No. Sorry. I suppose I'm just getting antsy myself. I'm not used to having nothing to do."

"Tell me about it. Do you remember that time Bats-" He stopped himself and put his hand to his ear. "What? Dick, slow down, I can't- Dick? Dick?" He stood suddenly, knocking the chair over.

"They found Jinx, but they're in trouble."

"We should call Mr Terrific for backup-"

"We'll do it on the way, c'mon!" He shot out of sight and towards the teleportation room.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

As they beamed in, Wally was surprised by the devastation that surrounded them. Whoever had taken Nightwing and Raven out, they were good. They were in the forest that acted as a makeshift border for Jump City, though Wally had rarely been here when he was with the Titans. Trees were overturned, the stumps still smoking slightly from whatever had caused them to fall in the first place. He saw something glinting on the floor, and knelt to find the shattered remains of one of Dick's birdarangs.

Shayera stood beside him, looking around the forest with her mace drawn.

"Are we getting any reinforcements?" Wally asked, looking around the darkened area. Moon light glinted between the trees, making him squint.

"Mr Terrific says the League's spread pretty thin at the moment. He says he'll send some help as soon as he can."

Wally nodded and stood. "Where could they have gone? It took us, what, like three minutes to get here?"

"Some people can move fast. And if Captain Marvel _is _involved, that would explain how wrecked this place is."

The Fastest Man Alive shook his head. "It couldn't be Captain Marvel who did this." He pointed to the smoking stumps of the collapsed trees. "See? Still hot. Unless Captain Marvel's suddenly got heat vision without telling anyone, I don't think it was him."

Shayera nodded, impressed with her friend's deductive reasoning. She spotted something in the distance and froze.

"Wally… look." She pointed to the distance, and Wally looked to see the Jump City observatory, with a newly installed telescope.

"Now, last time I checked, that wasn't there." He looked over at Shayera and nodded in the direction of the observatory. "C'mon, let's-"

A noise behind them made them turn. Stood before them was Jinx, a pink glow in her eyes and a blank expression on her features.

"Jinx?" Wally breathed. "Is that… you?" He walked forward slowly, only to be greeted by a wave of pink hex energy, sending him flying back and into a tree.

Shayera charged towards her, her mace ready to strike. Jinx snapped her fingers, and the mace was suddenly blown from her hands. Flash pulled himself to his feet and saw the mace flying towards him. He attempted to run out of the way, but another bad luck hex from Jinx and Wally tripped over his own feet, landing him flat on his face. The mace landed on his head with a resounding thud.

Shayera flew towards Jinx quickly and grabbed her by the collar. She suddenly noticed something on Jinx's forehead glinting in the moonlight. This moment of distraction was all Jinx needed. With a wave of her hand, Shayera was sent flying back into a tree. A snap of her fingers, and the tree collapsed onto Shayera. She attempted to roll away, but the tree simply followed her. She was knocked unconscious instantly. The last thing she saw was the glint of metal on Jinx's forehead.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

(A/N: Well, again, not much to say except… review!)


	8. Coming Together

Disclaimer: I don't own _Justice League Unlimited _or _Teen Titans_.

_**Connections**_

_**Chapter Eight: Coming Together**_

Consciousness came back to Wally slowly and drearily, his perceptions bouncing from enveloping darkness to blinding light. Gradually, he began to adapt to the dazzling light that blazed into his blue eyes, and took in his surroundings.

He was in the observatory that he and the others had visited just hours ago, though the bright lights that were so dazzling him gave it an even more haunting, eerie feeling. He looked up and saw the balcony that ran the entire circumference of the observatory, though some of it had collapsed from the battle between Robin and Professor Chang all those years ago.

Where there was once an empty space now stood a monstrous telescope, though now he was closer, Wally could see that it was some kind of weapon. He would have smiled if he didn't feel so groggy.

_A Big Laser Cannon. What is it with this crazy guys and big laser cannons?_

Upon looking down, he saw the crushed remains of his comm earpiece. He looked around to see the kind of restraints that he had been trapped in. Above him was a small control panel with flashing controls, strange beams of light being emitted from the bottom that had wrapped their way around Wally's arms and legs, his limbs being spread out in a star shape.

Another cursory glance to his left revealed Shayera, Nightwing and Raven similarly subdued. Their communication devices had been similarly wrecked. He saw that Shayera's mace was being kept afloat with a similar energy bond next to its owner. All of them seemed to be going through the same disorientation he was. The Fastest Man Alive surmised that it must be a side effect of the restraints, and only his enhanced metabolism allowed him to fight off the effects.

"Awake, human? It took you long enough."

The Flash looked up to see Captain Marvel looking down at him, his arms crossed and a vindictive sneer on his lips. Behind him, almost overcrowding the observatory, were a hundred or so monks in white robes, with a strange snake symbol on their chests. Wally managed a weak smile.

"I like to keep my fans waiting," he croaked, winking at the World's Mightiest Mortal.

Marvel gritted his teeth and struck Wally with the back of his hand.

"Be glad I'm not using the full strength of this vessel."

Flash frowned as his addled mind tried to process the information.

"Wait… vessel? What're you-?"

Captain Marvel smiled. "Of course; you don't know. But I most definitely want you to know who I am before you see the end of the world. You may remember a mystical stone that contained the spirit of Eclipso."

"Who?"

The Captain's eyes thinned. "Eclipso. The embodiment of the Snake Men."

Flash's frown deepened, but he nodded anyway. "Oh, _Eclipso._ Why didn't you just say so?"

"Don't test me, human. It doesn't matter how fast you are when you're strapped to the wall."

The trademark Flash grin crossed his face. "You'd be surprised how fast I can move when I'm strapped to something." His smile faded slightly as he was hit by a sudden bout of dizziness. Groggily, he continued. "You gonna finish your story or what?"

Grinding his jaw, Marvel seemed to think about striking him again, but then thought better of it. "I see you haven't changed since I last fought you."

"Sorry, still don't know you. I mean, the cape's familiar, but I'm blanking on the face," Wally joked, a weak grin on his face.

Marvel just seemed lightly amused by this. "My brothers and I tried to destroy the sun, to plunge you humans into eternal darkness. However, _you _and your comrades managed to destroy the gem that contained our spirits. Or at least, you tried to. You see, the gem contained the spirits of the last remaining snake men. When your friend here-" he said, nodding over to Shayera, "-smashed the gem, it separated the spirits into the individual pieces. And what did you do with the remaining pieces of the gem?"

"We… put it into containment on the Watchtower." Flash shook his head. "But Bats crashed the Watchtower into the Thanagarian bypass… How did-?"

"The Snake Men have many human followers, even in this distant and confusing age," Marvel said, gesturing to the hundred or so robed monks that stood around the observatory. Flash looked back at the World's Mightiest Mortal, and saw that his eyes had become snake like slits. He decided not to bother with trying to get through to the real Captain Marvel; at this point, he was more Eclipso than human.

"So these guys are like a cult or something?"

Eclipso nodded once slowly. "Exactly. They come from many walks of life. Some of them were part of the cleanup crew that helped to remove the remains of your Watchtower Fortress. Secretly, they managed to find the one last remaining piece of the gem, which is now safely kept… here." Eclipso lifted his right forearm, where there was something embedded beneath the skin. Wally grimaced in disgust.

"Dude, gross. You put it under your skin? And I thought getting a tattoo was nasty."

Either the lizard spirit hadn't heard him, or he simply decided to ignore him, Flash couldn't tell. Either way, he decided to continue on.

"Once they had recovered me, I decided that I needed a powerful body to reside in. But thanks to your new Justice League, I couldn't simply take any super powered body I wanted. I had to find one that wouldn't be missed. At least, not right away. Then I found out about Captain Marvel's resignation from the League. From there, it was simple to lay a trap and simply get him to grasp the gem."

The Fastest Man Alive was silent as his dulled brain struggled to think. "What about…" he began, looking around the observatory. He looked up to the balcony, and there, standing by herself, was Jinx, who was stood as still as a statue, staring blankly ahead.

"What about Jinx? Why… how?"

Eclipso smiled as he looked over at the pale skinned witch. "Why? Because you were the one to stop us. If not for you, we would be living in glorious darkness. So I had to find some way to lead you to me. Your brief relationship with her was not as private as you believed it to be. After studying her last known appearance in this very city, I decided that she must be alive. We Snake Men have not inconsiderable psychic abilities. It was a fairly simply matter for me to find her. But to control her, and in a manner that you could trace… that was another matter."

"So you broke into Mad Hatter's lab."

He nodded. "You're not as stupid as you act. But I had to leave something for you to find… to continue the trail. And so, I organised for the kidnapping of Bibbo Bibbowski, who I had found out had a friendship with Superman." He nodded over to the crowd, where a mind controlled Bibbo stood, although he was now dressed in the same robes as the others. Flash looked over at the possessed hero.

"And I bet you told that Eric Spiegel guy to leave his wallet in Bibbo's apartment, too."

"You are improving, Flash. And so, we left Bibbowski's blood in Tetch's lab for you to find. And, using that technology, we were able to recruit your friend Jinx…"

"So you were the one who led Raven to Fawcett… and knocked her away before she could find out who you were."

"Very good."

Wally shook his head in confusion. "But… the trail ran cold after Fawcett City."

Eclipso's face darkened. "Yes… you _were _supposed to find some more psychic residue there to trace to me… but due to the interference of an unanticipated third party, you did not."

Wally's eyes thinned. "Wait… youdidn't send that Slade guy? Then who did?"

Eclipso waved a dismissive hand. "It doesn't matter now. All that does matter is that you are here, and that you will see this," he said, gesturing to the telescope-turned-laser cannon. "You may have been able to stop the device from space, but you won't be able to stop it from here. Using the plans and equipment stolen from your human facilities, and with help from my human followers, I have managed to create a weapon that will fire-"

"Let me guess. A laser that will blot out the sun?"

"You can mock if it will make you feel better. It will be one of the last few good feelings you have." He turned to the operators of the huge cannon. "Begin."

"No…" Wally groaned through gritted teeth as he struggled with the energy bonds. He could hear the generator of the huge weapon building in pitch as it powered up. Lights on the side of the cannon built up as it prepared to fire. Suddenly, three throwing stars sliced into the control panel of the weapon, sending sparks everywhere and abruptly deactivating the cannon.

Flash looked around in confusion while Eclipso looked around in outrage. A voice echoed from above them, interrupting the possessed hero's angered protestations.

"I truly wish I didn't have to do this."

All heads in the observatory whipped around to see Slade stood on the balcony. He sighed.

"And while I would like nothing more than to see you all tortured until death… it seems I'll be requiring your help."

He quickly hurled himself forward, aiming to land in the middle of the crowd of monks. On his way down, he threw a small knife towards the control panel above Wally's head, causing sparks to fly and the restraints to disappear. The Scarlet Speedster began to feel the dizziness fading, and smiled when he could suddenly balance again. He saw Eclipso coming towards him with his fist and dashed to his left, leaping up and smashing the control panel that held Shayera and her mace afloat in the air.

Using the great speed that was his trademark, Wally grabbed the mace and swung it as fast and as hard as he could into Eclipso's gut. The magic powered body of Captain Marvel was sent hurtling away and through a wall by the magic negating properties of the Thanagarian's mace. He quickly ran back to Shayera and handed her the mace.

"I think this is yours."

She offered a weak smile and took the weapon, turning towards Nightwing and Raven to free them. She quickly slammed the crackling mace into the control panels sending sparks raining down on the captors as they fell to the floor.

Suddenly, Wally was knocked aside by a red clad arm, sending him hurtling across the Observatory, knocking over several monks as he went. Shayera turned in time to see Eclipso slam his fist into her chin, smashing her head into the wall behind her. She was knocked unconscious by the blow, and Eclipso smirked as he slowly made his way over to her still form. Grasping her by the hair, he pulled her up and brought back his fist.

"I never liked birds."

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Slade extended his leg as he landed, colliding with one monk's head and smashing it into the floor. Tossing himself forward in a flip, the one eyed mercenary landed in the middle of a crowd. Reaching into his belt, Slade pulled out his extendable staff, pushing the button to extend it fully.

"With the pain you are about to feel, I sincerely hope that you are truly devoted to your cause."

The monks approached with a roar. Using years of honed instinct with his superhuman strength and agility, Slade easily defended himself from the onslaught of opponents. They were obviously under trained when it came to fighting. A kick to the gut dropped a monk on his left, and a quick jab with his staff into the groin of one approaching from behind sent him groaning to the ground.

A heavy hand slammed into Slade, sending him hurtling back and into a stack of crates. The mercenary groaned and pulled himself from the crate and saw the source of the attack. The monk was so big, he would have been able to look Cinderblock straight in the eyes. His voice was a suitably low growl.

"Give up, little man."

The mercenary smiled beneath his ghoulish mask as he stood, cricking his neck. He twirled his staff and adopted a fighting stance, extending his hand beckoning his opponent forth.

"I wouldn't want to deprive myself of the amusement."

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The possessed Captain Marvel brought his fist down with all the speed he could muster, only for a black barrier to block the blow. He looked over in anger at Raven, but decided to continue to bludgeon his way through the black energy field, which had encompassed the unconscious Shayera completely. Before he could land another blow, a small bird shaped projectile was thrown between him and the energy field, exploding as soon as it reached him. He was tossed like a feather in the wind across the Observatory, crashing close to where he had earlier flung the Flash.

He pushed himself to his feet and prepared himself to charge forward. A red blur interrupted his path, grabbing on to his cape and swinging him by the piece of white material, going faster and faster until Eclipso could feel the oxygen being sucked from the lungs of Captain Marvel's body.

Flash let go of Eclipso, tossing him with all the strength and speed he could muster through the wall of the Observatory and into the forest behind it. Through the hole he had created, he could see trees being knocked aside as the Captain's body was sent hurtling through the woods.

Nightwing and Raven joined him. The Fastest Man Alive nodded towards the hole he had created.

"You take care of that cannon thing. I've got him."

Nightwing ducked a blow from a monk and threw him over his shoulder. "No. _We've _got him."

Flash shook his head. "I need you to look after Shayera. I can handle him by myself." He winked at the two Titans. "Trust me."

He shot off through the hole in the wall, leaving his two friends stood in the gust of wind he had created from his speedy exit. Dick looked over at Raven.

"Guess that's going to be me looking after Shayera, huh?"

Raven allowed a small smile before floating out through the makeshift hole in the wall. Sighing as he slammed an elbow into the nose of another monk, he looked over to see how Shayera was doing. His eyes widened beneath his thin sliver of a mask as he saw several robed Snake Men followers stalking towards her unconscious form. Using an approaching monk as a spring board, he propelled himself forward, and, with grace only years of training could produce, flipped through the air and landed between Shayera and the approaching monks.

With a flick of his wrists, two metal batons slid from his shadowy sleeves.

"You get one warning. Back off."

Somehow, Dick didn't think they would follow his advice.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

A frustrated growl was the only noise that Eclipso could manage. Captain Marvel was one of the most powerful beings on the planet. How could he be losing to such a rag tag group? It was ludicrous.

The thought was shaken from his mind as he saw the Flash fast approaching him, a trail of dust pursuing him as he approached. Eclipso prepared himself. He would end it here.

Wally took a deep breath and extended his arm outwards in a clothesline move, vibrating his arm as he went. Eclipso swung his fist forward as Wally arrived, and the Scarlet Speedster ducked beneath the blow and dragged his vibrating fist through Eclipso's chest. The possessed hero cried out in pain as Flash's molecules collided with his own at super sonic speeds.

The Fastest Man Alive skidded to a halt on the other side of Eclipso, surprised at how much pain that move had caused. The Snake Man was on one knee, clutching his chest in pain. Flash mentally shrugged.

_Well, if it worked once…_

Wally shot forward again, extending his arm in the same manner and preparing to do the same move again. However, Eclipso seemed to have learnt from his past mistake, and swung his arm around again, this time imitating Flash's clothesline move and nailing _him _in the chest.

There was a deafening crack and a sickening crunch as Wally's ribs snapped under the strain. Landing on his back, the Scarlet Speedster coughed violently. He wiped a hand on his chin, revealing blood.

"Oh, great…" he sputtered, "I just fixed those ribs…"

Eclipso brought his fist back to finish the job.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dick Grayson had been trained well by Batman, as well as the various martial arts masters he had trained with before he became Nightwing. He had learnt to engage fifteen men effectively; twenty at a stretch. But he drew a line at about thirty. So facing one hundred rabid followers of ancient Snake Men was proving most difficult for the ex-Boy Wonder.

He swung his right baton to his left, nailing a monk in the stomach. Using the left baton he struck the back of his calf, making him lose balance. Finishing the move, Nightwing brought his right baton up again and caught the monk on the chin, dropping him to the floor instantly.

He spotted movement to his right. He leant back to avoid a punch to face, crossing his batons to catch the arm of the monk between them. He kicked out as hard as he could, sending the monk flying back into his brethren.

One managed to hit him from behind, sending his right baton flying. Another slammed into him from the left, toppling him over. He managed to send a few others into unconsciousness, but no matter how badly trained they were, their sheer numbers gave them the edge. Dick leapt over to Shayera and picked up her body, using his grappling hook to get up to the upper balcony. As he landed and deposited the red haired Thanagarian gently on the ground, he saw Jinx stood on the far side of the balcony.

She was still stood perfectly still, as though she were a statue. After one last glance at the pink haired woman, he dove down into the crowd of robed followers.

As he landed, a dark figure collided with him, the both of them hurtling backwards and skidding across the floor. After getting to his feet, Nightwing came to face to face with Slade.

"Apologies, Robin. I'll try not to collide with you in the future."

Dick's eyes thinned as he fought off another barrage of monks. "Who are you?"

"I would have though you'd know that by now, Robin." He brought his palm up and slammed one opponent's jaw upwards, shattering his teeth, and sending blood spurting from his mouth.

"You're not Slade. I saw him die." Dick delivered a kick to another's head.

"Do you really think I couldn't survive that? Or find some way of faking my death? Time has made you sloppy."

Nightwing delivered an elbow to the gut, then brought his fist up to finish the job. "Why are you doing this?"

Slade let out a grunt of amusement. "You should know by now, Robin; I have no vested interest in the end of the world."

Dick clenched his teeth and broke one monk's nose. "My name isn't Robin." He turned towards his old foe, hatred burning in his eyes. "I'm Nightwing."

A sudden noise grabbed both of their attention; the cannon was starting up again. Slade let out a brief noise of surprise.

"It seems I didn't do as much damage as I thought."

On the upper balcony, Shayera stirred. She looked up and saw Jinx, frozen in place. Shayera began the long crawl over to her.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Raven moved as fast as she could above the trees, struggling to see where Wally had gone. He had created such a cloud of dust upon his speedy exit, it was making it difficult for her to see the red headed speedster. She heard a yell coming from the distance, and followed it to its source.

She arrived in time to see Eclipso knelt on one knee and Wally headed towards him, his hand vibrating at incredible speeds as she had seen him do so many times before as Kid Flash. As Flash reached his opponent, however, Eclipso suddenly turned and slammed his arm into Wally's chest, sending him violently onto the ground. Eclipso brought back his fist, and Raven shot downwards, extending her black magic towards the body of Captain Marvel.

Wrapping her black energy around his waist, she pulled as hard as she could, yanking him off his feet and into the air before he could even move his mighty fist towards Flash. He snarled in anger at her, attempting to escape from the black energy wrapped around him. Using as much strength as she could muster, Raven slammed her hands downwards, sending Eclipso hurtling towards the ground. As he slammed into the ground, a crater grew around him, sending dust billowing and chunks of wood and dirt hurtling outwards.

Wally rolled away as fast as he could to avoid being caught in the crater.

Through the clouds of grey mist, Raven could make out Eclipso getting to his feet. Gathering every last ounce of strength she had, she slammed a wall of black energy onto the body of Captain Marvel, forcing him back into the ground. Followed by another. And then another. She allowed her usually controlled emotions to escape through her magic, allowing her anger to power the energy.

Eventually, Raven's barrage ended. She gasped desperately for breath, unable to see anything through the cloud of dust she had created. Looking for Wally, she never saw the red blur bursting out of the ground, nor the body of Captain Marvel floating behind her. Then only thing she saw was a blur of red, followed by pain.

Flash struggled to his feet, clutching at his now healed ribs. Unfortunately, they had healed wrong. He heard a noise from above him, and looked up to see Raven hurtling away over the trees.

"Raven!"

He ran as fast as he could through the thick maze of trees and bushes, constantly glancing upwards to keep track of the dark empath. Eventually, he saw that she was descending through the thickly bunched branches of the trees. He turned sharply and ran up one of the trees, bouncing from branch to branch until he caught Raven in his arms. Landing on a precariously wiggling branch, he smiled in relief that she was still breathing. Her eyes opened slowly, becoming relieved at the sight of him.

"Do me a favour; next time you want to go gliding? Don't," he said, grinning.

"I'll keep that in mind," she groaned.

"Uh… would you mind…?" Flash nodded downwards at the thin branch upon which they were stood.

Raven nodded and floated them down to ground level. Wally smiled as they both landed, though his face quickly changed when he saw something approaching through the trees.

Eclipso was on his way.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Through the carnage, Slade managed to hazard a glance over at his former apprentice. A jab of the elbow here, an expertly timed judo throw there… he had improved his form considerably since Slade had last fought him. The mercenary wondered who would emerge the victor if the two fought now.

He pushed it aside as the noise from the cannon increased in pitch, and the lights on the side of cannon rose one notch. He caught the fist of a monk with his own, crushing it with his enhanced strength.

Seemingly appearing out of nowhere, the large monk rammed into him shoulder first, sending Slade through several other followers. He looked up from his sprawled position and saw the giant of a man making his way towards him threateningly.

Nightwing leapt onto the man's back, and, slapped his hands on both sides of his head with all of his strength. The giant roared in pain and grasped desperately around his back to reach his assailant. Nightwing attempted flip away, but no amount of training could enable him to avoid the random thrashing of the giant's arms.

Shayera inched her way towards Jinx.

He grabbed onto Nightwing's leg as he jumped, tossing him around as though he were a doll. The ex-Boy Wonder collided painfully with Slade, sending them both into the wall behind them. They looked up to see the giant man charging towards them. He grabbed both of their heads in his massive hands, mashing them into the walls. Slade was thankful that the walls in this observatory were thin.

The cannon's pitch increased.

As they struggled in the grip of the monstrous man before them, they looked over at each other. They couldn't reach the cannon in time to stop it going off. They both knew it, and yet they kept on fighting. Slade smiled beneath his mask; even after all this time, they were still the same.

Shayera collapsed at Jinx's feet. Using every last ounce of strength she had left, she pulled herself up on the railings of the balcony. The blow to the head from Eclipso had affected her balance and vision; everything was blurred and distorted. She felt constantly nauseous. And yet she continued on. As she reached forward, she wasn't even sure she was reaching for the right Jinx; she could see about five of them.

She touched the pink haired witch's head and felt for anything that would cause the metallic gleam she had seen earlier that night. Her fingers felt something metal wrapped around her head like a headband. Reaching inside her for all the strength she could muster, she ripped off the headband and collapsed to the floor.

Jinx's previously glazed eyes came back into focus. She put a hand to her head, looking around the observatory with complete and utter confusion painted on her face.

"Where…?"

Looking down, she saw the half conscious form of Shayera laid before her. The Thanagarian heroine pointed to the cannon.

"…stop…"

Shayera Hol collapsed to the floor, the last of her energy expended.

Jinx looked down at the scene unfolding before her. The tip of the laser cannon crackled with energy, as though about to be fired. Below her, she saw Nightwing and Slade struggling to reach the cannon, though failing miserably.

She made her decision.

Her eyes glowing a bright pink, she extended her hands and emitted the most powerful hex she could manage, sending out wave after wave of pink energy towards the humming cannon.

At first, nothing seemed to happen. Then sparks flew from the control panel of the machine, followed by an explosion that sent a large group of the monks sprawling. Explosions littered the cannon, travelling up and down the weapon until it began to collapse under its own weight.

The monks, though dedicated to their cause, were not going to stay around for the end result. They quickly began to excavate the Observatory, not caring for the fates of Nightwing and Slade.

The two enemies stood opposite each other as the monks ran around them, tripping over each other as they scrabbled for the exit.

"You may call yourself Nightwing. But you're still the boy that became my apprentice. We're still the same."

And that was it. One moment Slade was there, the next he wasn't; a monk ran in front of Dick's vision and blocked his view of the mercenary. That was all he needed to make his escape. A small part of his mind considered trying to pursue his old adversary.

A _very _small part.

He pulled the grappling hook from his belt and made his way to the balcony, where he found the unconscious Shayera and a far more lucid Jinx waiting for him.

"Can we please leave now?"

The ex-Boy Wonder grabbed them both and swung out of the building before it exploded.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The two heroes remained still behind the trees they were using as cover. Though how long this cover would last, Wally didn't know. They had been playing a cat and mouse game with Eclipso for quite some time now, until they reached the very edge of the forest, the bottom of a cliff face on their right, blocking their path. Raven leaned over as she spoke.

"So what do you know about Captain Marvel?"

He shrugged. "Not much. I know that he's powered by magic. As long as we don't say 'Shazam' we should be fine."

She cocked a purple eyebrow. "'Shazam'?"

Wally nodded. "Right. Don't say it."

"Why?"

"It'll make him even stronger."

Before Raven could ask any more questions, the trees above them were ripped away by the body of the World's Mightiest Mortal, who looked down at them sneeringly.

Moving quickly, Wally jumped to his left, landing on his side. Whirling his arms in front of him, he soon created two sets of cyclones that sent Eclipso back through the trees and into cliff face behind him. Slamming into the rock face full force, Marvel's body created an indentation in the wall. Raven's eyes glowed as she began her chant.

"Azarath, Metrion, Zinthos!"

Enveloping a tree in black energy, she hurled it at the World's Mightiest Mortal, who promptly ducked out of the way and charged towards them. Grabbing Wally before he could move, he whirled him around and into Raven, tossing them like toys into the cliff face. They looked up to see Eclipso with a superior smirk.

"You fools. Did you really think I wouldn't hear your conversation?" His smirk widened. "I know all about the secret of this vessel now, thanks to your human stupidity." He tilted his head up to the heavens.

"SHAZAM!"

The lightning bolt struck with a deafening crash, blinding Wally and Raven with the intensity of its light. As the light faded, the two could make out the unconscious figure of Billy Batson. Flash grinned as he saw the glinting of the sliver of gem that Eclipso had put under Marvel's skin.

Raven encompassed the gem in black energy, and Wally put his hands on his hips, looking directly at the small piece of gem.

"And _you _called _us _stupid?"

Raven couldn't help but smile.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Normally, he would find flashing lights annoying. But right now, they were the most soothing and relaxing things he'd ever seen. Wally slowly made his way over to Jinx, who was stood looking out over the city. Well, it appeared that she was looking at the city, but Wally knew what building in particular she was looking at.

"Looks kind of different from the outside, doesn't it?"

She only turned her head for a moment to see who was talking. Though she didn't really need to see him to know. She would know his voice anywhere.

"It looks so simple from the outside. But once you get in there, it's anything but."

Flash allowed himself a small chuckle at that. "Yeah…" His expression slowly changed from one of relief to one of concern. "So… what's the last thing you remember?"

She closed her eyes and put a hand over her eyelids. "I was home. Then I felt something in my mind, and then… I was here. I remember seeing brief flashes of other things, like you, Raven, the Boy Wonder over there…" she paused. "And the Hawk woman. That's how I knew what to do when I was brought out of it. I recognised her."

"Are _you_ okay?"

She sighed and gave him a small smile. "I'm fine. I just want to get home."

He tilted his head forward slightly. "And? Where's home?"

She turned her head towards him, a sardonic smile on her lips. "I don't think I should tell you that."

Although she couldn't see them, she knew his blue eyes were ready to bring on the 'hurt puppy' look. The one that would always get her when she was hanging out with Kid Flash all those years ago. The eyes that got her to leave her life of crime. And the eyes that made it so hard for her to leave…

"Why did you fake your own death?"

Jinx turned away from him, her head dropping down. "The HIVE doesn't leave you alone, Wally. They don't exactly take betrayal well. I thought I was safe when it was just the HIVE Five to worry about, but then when Brother Blood escaped from prison… I had to find a way to get them off my trail. So, I got together the right witnesses and… faked it."

Flash's jaw dropped slightly. "You broke into that warehouse… you knew the Titans would come running…"

She nodded slowly. "The HIVE had followed me to the warehouse, so I knew that in all the fighting between them and Titans, I'd be able to do it and no one would question it. But the Boy Blunder over there-" she said, nodding over to where Nightwing was stood with Raven. "-he wouldn't let it go. He came close to finding me. Real close. He just didn't stop. But I knew that if you heard it from him, you'd believe that I was gone."

He nodded dumbly. "I do… I mean… I did." He paused for a moment. "Why didn't you come to me for help? I would've-"

"Because you would have been the same old Kid Flash! Trying to convert me to becoming a hero, a Titan! That's-" she took a breath. "…That's not what I am. And I never could be." She turned back to look over the bay towards the Tower. "Besides," she muttered, "you seemed to be getting pretty cosy with Raven after I left."

"Jinx, that's… that's not…"

She turned towards him to face him fully and he lost the words somewhere in his throat. He sighed, struggling to keep his emotions in check.

"Will I see you again?"

She was silent for longest of moments.

"Probably not."

She turned and walked away, and Flash turned to look out over the city, unsure what to feel or do. He felt a delicate hand on his shoulder. Turning, he felt something warm pressed against his lips. He closed his eyes as Jinx embraced him. He pulled her to him, as though it would somehow stop her from leaving his life.

She slowly pulled away from him, looking him in the eyes.

"Thank you, Wally West," she said quietly. She backed away from him at first, then turned to disappear into the crowd of Jump City police officers, the flashing lights obscuring Wally's view of her.

He took a desperate step forward, then whirled on his heel to look out over the city, grabbing at his head in exasperation. He allowed himself to roughly sink down to the floor, despondently staring out over the city. He didn't know how long he was sat on the ground before his friends joined him. He gathered it was a long time, considering that the flashing sirens of the police cars were gone.

Raven sat on his left, and Nightwing next to her, while Shayera sat on his right.

"So? How'd it go?"

Wally sighed. "All things considered… it could have been worse."

"Are you okay?"

The Scarlet Speedster burst out laughing, causing Shayera to recoil slightly in surprise. "No," he said, still laughing. "But I will be," he finished, a slightly content smile on his face. Shayera returned the smile, putting an arm around her friend and squeezing his shoulder reassuringly.

"Thanks, Shayera."

She shrugged. "Can you honestly say you wouldn't do the same for me?"

He didn't respond; he didn't need to. They already knew the answer. He smiled at her and slowly turned to face Dick and Raven.

"What about that Slade guy?" He looked over at Dick. "I, uh… if it was him, that is."

A small smirk spread across Nightwing's face. "It was him. But he got away."

"And you're okay with that? Who are you? Where's Dick Grayson?"

Ignoring the joke, Dick just shrugged. "It just… wasn't important. He's a ghost; I'm going to leave him dead."

Raven cocked an eyebrow and looked over at Flash. "Wally… how did you know that the 'Shazam' thing would work? What if the gem hadn't been removed from his body?"

"Uh… I didn't."

"You _didn't?"_

He shrugged desperately. "Well… I figured if Snake Man was still in control we could just stop him from saying 'Shazam' again, and you'd be able to… take it out."

Raven opened her mouth.

Raven closed her mouth.

"Oh."

She returned her gaze to look out at the city.

Flash looked out over to Titans Tower, then over to the three people sat around him. The three people who had helped for no other reason than because he was their friend.

The Fastest Man Alive leapt to his feet, stretching. He looked down at Shayera. "Hey, how'd you like to sleep in Titans Tower overnight? I can show you Mega Monkeys Five…" he said in an enticing tone of voice.

Raven cocked an eyebrow. "And that's supposed to make her _want _to come?"

Shayera shrugged. "I like Mega Monkeys Five."

Dick lowered his mask as though they were sunglasses. "You li-" he stopped himself and put his hands up in surrender. "Right. Never mind." He hopped to his feet and joined his red headed friend as he walked down the hill, quickly followed by Shayera and Raven.

"Why? What's wrong with Mega Monkeys Five?"

"Besides the fact that it's the same game as Mega Monkeys One to Four?"

"Hey, dude – it's a formula that works. Don't mock it."

The Flash wasn't good with the little things in life. But he had what mattered.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

(A/N: Whew. That was a big one.

Now, just to be clear, Eclipso was possessing Captain Marvel, so if that wasn't clear, I apologise.

I'm hoping I covered all the clues that were laid out all over the place, and yes, it _is _a bit of stretch to believe that Eclipso would know that Flash would be able to follow them all, but hey, this _is_ fiction, so… Nyah.

This is also the first time I've done chapter with so many fights going on at the same time, so be merciful if the pacing was a bit off. I've got to say, I was inspired by the insane fight that was the Teen Titans versus The Brotherhood of Evil in 'Titans Together'.

And there's an Epilogue to come, folks, so don't lose interest _just_ yet.

Anyway, reviews are good.)


	9. Epilogue

Disclaimer: I don't own _Justice League Unlimited _or _Teen Titans._

_**Connections**_

_**Epilogue**_

_The Flash_

As Wally walked through the foyer of the Metro Tower, he heard someone approaching from behind. From the way the footsteps were spaced out, he knew it could only be one person.

"Hey, Ralph."

"Keep it down, would you?"

Flash couldn't help but grin. "The whole secret identity thing again, Ralph?"

Elongated Man put a stretched finger to his lips. "Not _everyone _needs to know my name, you know."

"It's not like you hide it or anything." Wally smiled mischievously. "And besides, if anyone finds you out, you can just disguise yourself as a vase again."

"Oh, ha ha. I'll have you know that those were the most traumatic three days of my life."

"Yeah, it would have been if it actually happened," Wally replied, smiling as he reached the elevator and pushed the call button.

Ralph just grumbled unintelligibly. As the elevator doors opened, a smirk emerged on the stretchy hero's face as he saw who was inside. Wally's, on the other hand, disappeared. There, in the elevator, stood Fire. With a nervous smile, Wally stepped in, glad that Ralph was there to punctuate the awkward silence that would follow. Ralph's smirk took on an evil quirk.

"Y'know, I think I'll take the stairs. I need the exercise."

The doors to the elevator shut before Wally could move.

Flash hung his head in defeat as he grit his teeth.

_What is it with this damn elevator? It must be cursed or something._

It had started happening as soon as he took up working in the Metro Tower. Every day, he would come to work and get in the elevator. And every day, Fire would get in too, prompting some awkward and horrible silence to ensue. As was happening once again now. He looked over to the green haired Brazilian, who had also looked over at him. He offered a small smile, and she replied in kind.

Flash decided to just ignore her, as he always did when he was stuck with her. He scowled at himself.

_What're you doing? Haven't learnt anything from what you just went through?_

Wally scrunched up his face.

_Screw it._

He turned towards Fire, the easy Flash smile on his face.

"Morning."

The green haired woman looked over at him as though he were some alien creature. Wally wasn't surprised. He hadn't said more than a few coherent words to her in this elevator for some time.

"Um… good morning."

"How are you? We haven't talked since that Blackhawk Island thing, am I right?"

Her face still slightly numbed with surprise, she just nodded. "Uh… right."

The Fastest Man Alive cocked his head to the right. "So? How've you been?"

"I-" she cleared her throat. "Good. I've been good. You?"

He shrugged nonchalantly. "Eh, you know. Same old, same old. A few supervillains here, a few natural disasters there… the usual." Fire let out a small laugh, and Wally surprised himself. The smile on his face became genuine. The anxiety faded away.

He was just talking to a co-worker.

The elevator doors opened, and with an ease he hadn't felt for a long time, he pointed down the corridor.

"Hey, our shift doesn't start for another half an hour. You want to grab some coffee in the commissary?"

Fire's smile grew. "I'd love to."

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

_Nightwing_

His blue eyes flitted over to the clock in the corner.

_4:00 AM. I guess that's not **too **bad._

His eyes itched for him to rest. A yawn forced its way up his chest, and no amount of rigorous Bat-training would be able to stop it. He stretched out as he yawned noisily, the chair creaking as he straightened his back. Something compelled him to stand, and he pushed himself to his feet, rotating his upper torso left and right to stretch his arms and wake himself up.

He briefly wondered why he was up so late, but one glance at the computer screen refreshed his memory. And yet, he still had to wonder why. He remembered clearly what he had said to his friends at the Observatory a week ago.

"_It just… wasn't important. He's a ghost; I'm going to leave him dead."_

He shook his head.

"_He's a ghost."_

The ex-Boy Wonder walked over to the table and sat down, again tapping away on his laptop to find any other appearances of the mercenary. He had found nothing. Slade had disappeared off the face of the Earth after his 'death'. Dick grit his teeth.

Only for him to reappear out of nowhere to torture him yet again. Something hot surged through his veins, and Dick suddenly stood, angrily swiping out with his arms and flinging the flat monitor across the screen. It shattered on impact, keys and circuit boards clattering to the ground noisily.

Collapsing back into the chair, Dick rubbed his eyes with his hands, sighing loudly. Why was he doing this to himself?

"_He's a ghost."_

He looked over at the phone.

Would Bruce know?

Dick frowned.

_Would he tell me if he did?_

"Dick?"

He looked up to see Kori stood in the doorway to the bedroom. "Are you all right? I heard a crash…" she looked over to the shattered remains of the laptop. Her eyes glared at him accusingly.

"What was the error this time? Did you forget to update the antivirus program?"

That brought a smile to the raven haired hero. "No… it's nothing like that."

"Then what is it?"

"It's…"

He looked over at the laptop.

"_He's a ghost."_

He looked up at Kori.

"_I'm going to leave him dead."_

"…nothing." He stood up and walked over to her, gently leading her back into the bedroom. "C'mon. I'm tired, and we've got a dinner date tomorrow."

"Really? With who?"

"You'll see."

He closed the door without looking back.

A dark shadow moved away from the window and made its way up to the roof. Once there, it paused. He briefly pondered going back and telling him.

"Having a change of heart, are we?"

The Dark Knight turned in alarm, a batarang at the ready. No-one could sneak up on him like that. He remained silent as Slade emerged from the shadows, his hands behind his back confidently. Somehow, Batman knew he wasn't here to fight him. He slowly put away his weapon, slotting it into his belt.

"He's-"

"Better off this way?" he cut in, his voice overbearing with an infuriating smugness. His singular eye thinned. Batman could almost see the smirk beneath his ghoulish mask. "So much for your vaunted morals."

He turned and ran off the rooftop, dropping down the gap between the two buildings. The Dark Knight ran to the ledge, and was unsurprised to see that the mercenary was gone without a trace.

He looked back to Dick's room in silence, his expression remaining stony and impassive.

Without a word, he pulled out his grappling hook and swung away.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

_Raven_

She scowled as the teenage speedster tapped the buttons indescribably fast. Kid Flash looked over at her hopefully.

"Aw, c'mon Raven! I need someone to play against!"

She looked over at the brown haired boy warningly. "No."

"But I-"

"No."

Bart made a face and put up his nose. "Fine."

Sighing, the dark empath attempted to get back to her meditation. She closed her eyes and began to find her center. She focused on her breathing, letting it be the only thing that she could feel. She let it surround her, drawing her in…

"Raven?"

Her eyes snapped open. "No!"

The young Flash threw his hands around, exasperated. "Oh, but… c'mon! There's no bad guys around to bother us! I just thought we could-"

"Bart. No."

The monitor screen flashed, indicating an incoming call. Casting one last warning gaze at Kid Flash, she floated over to the screen and accepted the call.

"Titans Tower."

"_Hello! Would you be interested in heat conserving double glazed windows?" _The grinning visage of the Flash appeared on the screen. Bart beamed.

"Hey Wally. What's up?"

"_A lot, actually." _His face lit up as her remembered something. He snapped his fingers. _"Oh yeah, get over here; I've got something cool to show you."_

A brown eyebrow rose. "What is it?"

"_It's something cool."_

Bart's eyes thinned suspiciously. "But what is it?"

"_Would you just get your Kid Flash butt over here? I want to show you this cool thing already!"_

"Just show me over the screen."

"_No, it-"_ Flash stopped himself, gritting his teeth. _"It's something you have to see in person. Just… get over here!"_

Kid Flash threw his arms up in the air in surrender. "All right, fine! But if this is a prank, I'm never coming to your apartment again."

"_Trust me; you'll like it."_

With one last cautious glance at Wally's grinning face, he sped out the door and towards Central City. Raven looked back at Wally.

"What is it?"

"_What, like I'm gonna tell you? If you wanna see it, you've got to come here as well."_

"Well, we're all having dinner tonight anyway, aren't we?"

His face remained blank.

"You suggested it, remember?"

Flash laughed. _"Oh, yeah… the dinner thing. Yeah."_

Raven sighed.

"Just ask Shayera. She'll know what you're talking about."

"_Uh… okay."_

She walked back and sat on the sofa. "So… you said you've been pretty busy. Anything new?"

"_Uh… oh yeah! I got a new job!" _he said, his face lighting up with the excitement of a five year old.

A deep purple eyebrow cocked, Raven smiled slightly. "A new job? What are you doing?"

"_Don't laugh now,"_ he said, still trying to hold back his excitement. _"But I'm with the Central City Crime Scene Investigations unit."_

The dark empath began coughing uncontrollably. At least, she hoped it came across as coughing. She laughed so rarely, she didn't have much experience covering it up. Flash's eyes rolled beneath his mask.

"_Yeah, yeah, yuk it up. But it's a cool job."_

"_What's a cool job?"_

Wally turned to see Bart stood behind him.

"_I got a job with the Central City CSI."_

Kid Flash burst out laughing, and Wally scowled. _"It's not **that** funny."_

Raven shook her head. "But… how? You just… asked for a promotion?"

Wally shook his hands. _"No, no nothing like that. There was a criminal's car in the police garage where I work, and I noticed something that the other CSI guys must've missed. Everyone has an off day, I guess. Anyway, they had an opening, and since I have the qualifications anyway, one of the higher up guys asked me if I wanted the job."_

"You… have qualifications?"

"_Yeah. I didn't go to college **just **for the booze, y'know."_

Raven nodded, visibly impressed. Wally raised a finger, a cocky smile on his face.

"_But that's not all," _he said, adopting his best game show host voice. _"Yesterday, I went and had some coffee with Fire, the green haired Brazilian beauty."_

Bart jaw fell in the background. Raven's eyebrows rose in surprise.

"Really? This _is_ the Fire that you've been afraid of since she joined the League?"

"_Hey, I wasn't **afraid **of her. She was just… intimidating. Anyway, we've had coffee this morning, too, so… that's cool. She's really nice, too. Not just smoking hot."_

Raven nodded. "Well… that's great, Wally. I'm happy for you."

Wally bowed theatrically. _"Thank you, madam. And you? What have you been up to?" _He leaned closer to the monitor, winking at her. _"Anything on the old romance side of things?"_

The dark empath shifted in her chair uncomfortably. "Well… I-"

"_Who is it? Someone on the team? It's someone on the team, isn't it?"_ He turned and looked at Bart. _"Who is it?"_

Bart shrugged. _"I dunno. I didn't even know she was dating anyone on the team. I didn't even know she dated."_

"Well, thanks for _that_," Raven murmured, causing Bart to sink slightly.

Flash, meanwhile, was nowhere near giving up. _"Who is it? Vic? Garfield? It's Garfield, isn't it?"_

"Wally-"

"_It's Garfield! I knew it!"_

Bart's eyes nearly popped out of his mask. _"No way! You and Beast Boy?"_

"It's not Garfield!"

"_Oh, it so is, dude."_

"I'm going to finish this conversation now."

"_Okay, okay, I'll leave it alone." _He paused for a moment. _"So, Garfield huh? What's that like?"_

She turned off the monitor. At the Justice League Metro Tower, Flash turned to his teenage sidekick.

"It's so Garfield."

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

_Shayera_

Although there were many false tales she had spun to the League when she was undercover, many were also true. For instance, she _was _a good detective. Through her own admission, she wasn't as good as Batman, and the insane leaps of 'logic' made by the Question were beyond her comprehension, but she could follow up leads and find missing people pretty well.

And that is exactly what she had done. She regretted having not told Wally what she was doing, but he had been through enough in the previous week, and had finally seemed to make peace with his past. To pull him into this would only drag him back down again. She was taken from her thoughts by the sight of her quarry. She had managed to track her to a small village in Eastern India, though why she was living here, Shayera had no idea.

It was hard to believe she was the same girl that Wally had been searching for so diligently. Gone were her gothic clothes, as well as the horn styled hair. The only thing that Shayera could recognise her by was her pale skin, which was hidden well by the robes that covered her. This in itself Shayera thought was strange. From everything she had heard from Nightwing and Raven about her personality, she seemed to be the type to flaunt her figure.

But then again, that wouldn't work well with the whole 'disappearing' thing. She cautiously made her way over the low rooftops, following the robed figure back to her home.

Shayera landed on the rooftop as silently as possible as the robed woman stopped at the door.

"What do you want?"

Shayera looked around for anyone else that she could be talking to.

"Yeah, you. You may as well come down from the roof; I've known you were following me for a while."

The winged woman dropped down off the roof and landed beside her. "Then why didn't you do anything?"

The robes shook, and Shayera surmised she was shrugging. "I had to finish my shopping."

She walked forward and unlocked her door, walking through quickly. Shayera watched the door as it remained open.

"Are you coming in, or can I close the door?"

The Thanagarian shook herself out of her reverie and entered the small house. It wasn't what she was expecting. It looked… comfortable. But, what some people called comfortable, others called boring. And Shayera had had Jinx pegged as one of the people who would call a comfortable life boring.

People were surprising her left and right lately.

"I'd ask you how you found me, but that's not really important, is it?" She seemed to pause, as though waiting for a response.

"Why are you here?" Jinx said, removing her robe and tossing it nonchalantly on the back of a nearby chair. She carried the shopping bag into the kitchen, but paused in the doorway.

"He's not… here with you, is he?"

Shayera shook her head. "No. It's just me."

Her eyes thinned. "Then… why _are _you here?"

"I wanted to know… why you left Wally."

A thin smile spread across her pale features. "Which time?"

"Either. It's probably the same reason for both, right?"

The thin smile remained, and she sat down. "It's not as though I didn't care for him. I did. That's what made the whole thing so… infuriating, you know? I was happy enough to be a member of the H.I.V.E, and then… boom, in comes Kid Flash. And in the space of one night, he's started to confuse me about everything I've been certain of in my entire life. But he was right. I liked the criminal stuff, but it just didn't feel… good anymore."

"So you decided to become a hero?"

She let out a snort of derisive laughter. "Right. I only became a hero in the first place because of him. He convinced me to help them beat the Brotherhood, and I was glad to do it. Looking back, I'm not sure if it was because I actually wanted to be good, or if it was a vengeance thing, or if it was just him that convinced me. But, I stayed afterwards, taking orders from the guys I was fighting months before. It drove me crazy. I couldn't do it."

She looked over at Shayera, her pink eyes staring directly into hers. "But it came so easy to him. He made it seem as though it was nothing. And for a while, that helped me too. But it didn't last."

"So you decided to leave," Shayera said, more in an understanding tone than an accusatory one.

Jinx just nodded. "I didn't know what I wanted. I was confused, I admit that. I was young; all young people are stupid and confused. But I knewwhat was _wrong_ for me. And being a criminal was not suited to me. Being a hero didn't work either. So I had to find something else. He didn't want to admit that I couldn't be a hero."

Shayera nodded. "That sounds like him."

"Look… it was better that he found out earlier on. What would have happened if I had continued on like nothing was wrong, pretending to be something I'm not… until it all exploded out in the open? Do you know what that feels like?"

"I've… got a general idea."

A silence filled the room. Though not particularly awkward or comfortable, there was something unsettling about it. Shayera's earpiece beeped quietly, and she put her hand to it.

"Shayera."

A few nods later, and she ended the transmission. Jinx smiled.

"Hero stuff?"

Shayera nodded and turned. As she reached the doorway, she paused, looking over her shoulder at Jinx.

"Jinx… he only did it because he cared about you."

She didn't say anything. She wasn't even looking at her anymore; she was looking blankly away at the bag of food and clothing she had bought earlier.

Shayera turned away, and with a beat of her wings, was airborne once again. Ignoring the amazed gasps of idle passers by, she went on to her mission.

Jinx walked into the kitchen and over to the window ledge, where a picture of Kid Flash and Jinx together rested.

"I know."

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

_As Wally West sat in the restaurant, only one thought dominated his usually busy mind:_

That's a big burger.

_He was once again in Louie's Diner. The giant limo sized burger was back. The previous talking burger incident forgotten, Wally rubbed his hands together in anticipation, licking his lips._

"_I'm so hungry, I could eat two."_

_Another burger appeared on top of the first. Wally grinned._

"_Cool."_

_He opened his mouth and moved forward when the burger opened, a familiar yet muffled voice coming through._

"_Wally?"_

_Flash's head fell. "Damn."_

His eyes opened slowly, the world coming into bleary focus. Getting up out of the chair slowly, he struggled over to the door and fumbled with the bolts for what seemed to him like an hour. Gradually waking up, he managed to unlock the door, revealing Shayera waiting in the doorway, an impatient hand on her hip.

"What were you doing?" She cocked an eyebrow. "Did you fall to sleep again?"

Flash shook his head slowly. "_No._ I was just…" He paused. "Fine, I was sleeping. I've had a busy day. Besides, it's only because _you_ were so late."

Shayera sighed. "I'm not even going to _have_ this argument again. We told the others we'd be there by 7:00."

Wally snorted, waving a dismissive hand. "We'll be fine, it's-" he looked over at the clock. "-7:30."

"Can we go now?" Shayera asked, failing to hide her smile. Wally nodded when his eyes suddenly widened.

"Yeah, but I gotta show you something quickly."

The Thanagarian red head rolled her eyes. "Wally, I really don't-"

"Trust me, this is cool. Bart liked it."

Shayera put a hand over her eyes. "Oh, joy."

He whizzed over to his chest of drawers. Pulling out a yellow ring, he looked back at her.

"Huh? What do you think?"

Looking at it closer, she realised that there was a Flash symbol engraved on the ring.

"It's… nice, Wally. Can we go?"

He raised a finger in protest. "Wait wait wait. You haven't seen the best part yet. Watch this."

Squeezing the ring, the symbol flipped open, and a limp trail of red and gold sprang out. Wally dashed into it, spinning around and sending his clothes flying in every direction. He stopped spinning and grinned, now in his full Flash costume.

"See?"

"That's-" Shayera paused. "-impressive. Where did you get the money to do that? I didn't think your new job paid _that_ much."

"Actually, they're not that expensive." He looked at the opened ring. "It's just kinda hard getting the costume back in."

Shayera smiled. "Come on. We're still pretty late."

Flash smirked. "Not if I have anything to say about it." He looked at her back. "Wow. That spell from Zatanna really worked, huh?"

She nodded in agreement. "Between this and the brown hair, I don't think I'll get recognised."

Wally ran around the room in a blur, taking off his Flash costume and getting dressed at such speed that Shayera could barely see anything. Putting on a fresh Flash ring, he headed for the door, gesturing for her to go first. After locking the door behind them, they made their way to the streets below. He turned to his Thanagarian friend.

"Should I get us there 'Fastest Man Alive' fast, or-"

Shayera put up a hand. "Maybe we should just get the bus."

He shrugged. "Okay."

As they joined the large group of people waiting to get on the bus, Shayera couldn't help but feel a small knot in her stomach. Even after being forgiven by the League, she couldn't help but feel nervous around the public. She felt an arm wrap around her shoulder, and she looked over to see Wally smiling at her reassuringly.

"Hey, anyone makes trouble; they'll have to deal with me." He tilted his head forward so he was looking up at her. "Okay?"

A content smile spread across her face. "Okay."

The bus arrived, and everyone stepped on. Wally was about to push his way on, when his conversation with Clark at the Daily Planet entered his brain.

"_You could show some more manners, you know."_

"_Look, Clark, they aren't exactly the most polite people in Central and Keystone. If you nicely step aside to let people get on the bus before you, you don't get on."_

Remembering the tired look on the Man of Steel's face, he stopped himself and stepped aside, letting the others pass before him. Some thanked him, some didn't.

But it didn't matter.

Because they got on the bus.

They sat next to each other in silence, looking at the various sights of Central City in idle curiosity.

"So where are we going?"

Wally smiled. "Louie's Diner."

Shayera smiled back. "Good."

They rode on.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The End.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

(A/N: That's all, folks.

Now, I know that Flash will eventually end up with Linda (Wally and Linda, to me, are as sure a thing as Lois and Clark), but I thought that he could at least date Fire for a while.

Also, I wanted this to be lead in of sorts to 'Flash and Substance'. I'm not going to spoil it for those of you who are yet to see it (February 11th in the US), but I _will _say to look at Flash's demeanour in the episode, and the way he responds to Linda. That, to me, shows that he's moved on from his old attitude.

I definitely wanted to put a full stop on the whole Dick/Slade obsession thing, too. He's grown from being the pseudo Batman clone he was in season 1 of _Teen Titans_, and I wanted to show that. And just to reinforce the point, I put Batman in there too to show the opposite end of the spectrum. Neat, eh?

There are other aspects of this Epilogue that lead into 'Flash and Substance' too, but I'm going to leave that for you to see.

And finally, I wanted to thank those of you who reviewed (and reply to some of the anonymous ones):

Lins – ah, my first reviewer. Thanks for your reviews.

Balletangel19 – you got some good stories goin' on. I particularly like the Flash/Hawk prank one.

TouchofViolet - 'It's Gotta Be Love' is such a great story.

ChunkyMunky241 – Man, your advice and reviews are great, and I appreciate that you criticized as well as praised. You really helped give me to get the next chapter out. Keep up 'Many Times, Many Ways'.

Iamhollywood – I hope you post that Creeper/Fire/Ice story you had in the works; I want to see it online, dammit!

sokerfreek922 – And thanks to you too for being honest with your reviews. It's great to see 'great, keep going!', but it helps more to see 'great, but…'

Gotham's Princess – It's thanks to you that Nightwing was even in this story. Come to think of it, half of the Titans references are because of your reviews. Thanks for increasing my knowledge of the Titan comic world in general – I had no idea that Wally had dated Donna.

Gizmo – I'd just like to thank you for your reviews here and on (shameless plug) my _Teen Titans _story, 'A Strange Business'.

stephie1974 – Hey, one review's cool. Anything to keep my review count going up!

TonyStarkakaIronMan – Your advice on the fight scenes was invaluable; the Slade versus everyone else fight in Chapter 6 was much better than it would have been.

4musketeers – Thank you for your reviews. Can't say much more than that.

Meichan-24 – Thanks for your reviews, too. Sonic the Hedgehog stories, eh? I'll have to read some.

Silverswords – Thank you very much for your offer. I'll probably be e-mailing you about some comic info for a story I have in mind.

dee-unlm1t3d – Thanks for reviewing (cool name, by the way).

Meiriona – I was waiting for you review – you're pretty much the authority on Jinx related stories. Hopes for an update of 'Shreya to Jinx'.

Itsa C. Kret – after reading your profile, I can't help but agree with you about grammar and spelling (though I tend to be more anal about my own work than others )

God of Static – Thanks for your reviews. I can always use more praise.

Me – Damn, you knew it was Eclipso from the beginning? You are a good detective.

Hhgbh – Thanks for your reviews, and thank you for pointing out the one thing I forgot about in Chapter 8 (Bibbo)… grrrrrr…

Shay Bo Bay – Thanks for your reviews too, and yeah… Batman and Wonder Woman are a fun pairing, if not entirely healthy…

Doza – I'm glad you liked it! Thanks for reviewing!

And… thanks to anyone else who reviews this chapter.

So… yeah, review.)


End file.
